Finding Filippo Benitvegna: 28 Febbraio 2012

By Joey

Twice we have tried to find "fillipo of the heads" and failed. Second to the last day here and we are going to try again. Here's the link to the story about Filippo Benitvegna, the crazy sculptor who carved hundreds of heads in stone and filled his property with them. http://globalhomesicilia.blogspot.com/2012/02/looking-for-bentivegna-finding-friscia.html  I convinced Bernie to walk there again even though we couldn't be sure it was open (off-season hours). We needed to walk off the cannoli that we had for breakfast.  Beautiful day and we arrived there at 10:30 and the gates were open. I was sooooo happy. It is a really amazing place which I think only pictures can describe. I took a lot of photos. The shear number of heads and how they are displayed is fantastic. I really liked the ones where he very obviously used the shape of the stone to inform the face he'd carve.   Here is only a tiny fraction of the photos. Bernie worked on a drawing and took photos for future work. We stayed for a couple hours, the only ones there, and when went to leave, we were locked in. A little disconcerting with no phone and not being certain when anyone would return. Bernie discovered a place we could climb over the wall very carefully avoiding the barbed wire. Then we ended up in a field confined by more barbed wire. After searching a bit, we were able to find a place to squeeze through. Whew!