July 20th – The day began with a guest lecturer, Mr. Timothy Lean, a design engineer born and raised in the UK. He is long-term work visa resident of Italy, currently serving under contract with the Ferrari Formula One Team. Mr. Lean presented a serious, but often humorous lecture titled “A British layperson’s experiences of cultural heritage in Italy.”
Mr. Timothy Lean – Ferrari F-1 Consulting Engineer.
At the completion of Mr. Lean’s lecture, the class traveled to both of Ferrari’s museums, walking to the first one in Modena and traveling by bus to the second one in Maranello.
At the Modena Museum we received a general overview covering financial and visitation trends for both Ferrari museums. It was presented by the museums’ Communications Manager Signora Elizabeth Zanni. Of note, she previously lived in the US when working for a Ferrari dealership in Beverly Hills, California. The class also enjoyed an upscale Italian cuisine lunch at the restaurant located within the Modena Ferrari Museum.
Mr. Lean has a broad interest and strong appreciation for all aspects of Italian culture. He offered serval comments which confirmed his respect for all aspects of Italian living.
For one example of contrasting the UK and Italian cultures, Mr. Lean stressed that the majority of Italians take great pride in their national identity and in this way their society stands out from most others. He also pointed out that Italy excels in a broad range of human endeavors including: architecture, education, engineering, fashion, food, mathematics, science and most of the arts.
There were many comments and observations shared by Mr. Lean that clearly indicated that he has a high appreciation for cultural heritage matters. One humorous anecdote was his explanation of casually bicycling or walking over a number of bridges in Italy only to later discover that they remain intact structures from the Roman era. Furthermore, they are still utilized in a very casual way for their original purpose two-thousand years later. He explained how if any ancient Roman structure was discovered in the UK, it would soon be under glass and anyone attempting to ride a bicycle over it would find themselves in jail.
Many students chuckled when Mr. Lean contrasted UK/IT museums. His example of many “extraordinary things” in Italian museums often being randomly placed among mundane items and these “extraordinary things” having little or no information for museum visitors.
Another contrast pointed out by Mr. Lean pertained to having both ingenuity and creative work around solutions when construction projects discover ancient archeological finds.
Mr. Lean also shared the example of NoviArk project where a sunken Roman road was discovered during the construction of an underground car parking garage. The solution was to move a 118-meter section of the sunken Roman road above ground into the new park so the project could continue and the road would be both appreciated and preserved. The story is featured on the Visit Modena website. “The archaeological park NoviArk represents the meeting point between the needs of realization of underground parking NoviPark and preservation and enhancement of archaeological remains” (IAT, n.d.).
Signora Elizabeth Zanni – Ferrari Museum’s Comm. Manager
The presentation by the Ferrari Museum’s Communications Manager Signora Elizabeth Zanni was interesting but not nearly as extensive as Mr. Lean’s presentation. To me, the single most significant fact revealed was that 70% of the vehicles on display in the Ferrari museums (worth hundreds of millions of Euros) are privately owned. They are loaned to the museums at no cost, with exceptions for transport paid by the museums for some cars on a case-by-case basis.
Did Aston-Martin Make A Smaller Copy Of This Ferrari for James Bond?
From my personal experience to the best of my knowledge this statistical ratio is essentially reversed in the United States auto museums. Signora Zanni clearly confirmed that it is the private owners love of their Ferrari vehicles (plus inferred personal bragging rights) to have their own vehicles displayed in either Ferrari Museum.
Select your own customized brakes, fabric, leather, paint color, and wheels!
We learned both Ferrari museums are for profit entities, wholly owned by the parent corporation, and have over 600,000 visitors annually. It was fully apparent our assigned reading about the Motor Valley Cluster (which includes many other auto manufacturers) was not on display – it was all Ferrari. The Modena Museum is a breath-taking example of their historic products and the Maranello museum is focused on current products and a tribute to their F-1 victories. The Ferrari vehicles are all fantastic “things” but there is scant information in the museums about them, their development, or their histories. This is in stark contrast to my observed in US auto museums. After the two museums visits some JHU students commented that the museums were ‘one great big advertisement.’ But all things considered, these are Ferrari own museums, and they were gracious to us. Grazie mille!!!
Hmm… Now which shade of red was the old Magnum P.I.s Ferrari 308 GTS? Wasn’t it a Quattrovalvole? Don’t police ticket a lot of red cars?
Looking online for supplemental information about Enzo Ferrari actually led to finding a biography about him featured in the online Motor Valley Cluster website published by the Associazione Motor Valley. It was very apparent that much of the information from the online article (graphics and text) was used verbatim for interpretive information about Mr. Ferrari in the “Original Garage” at Modena. Which way the info flowed is unknown.
References:
Alberti, F. and Guisti, J., 2012. Cultural heritage, tourism and regional competitiveness: The Motor Valley cluster. Center for Creative and Cultural Industries Research, LIUC University, Italy. Elservier, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ccs.2012.11.003
AMV, n.d. MOTOR VALLEY STORIES, PERSONALITIES: Enzo Ferrari: “We can not describe passion, we can only live it.” Associazione Motor Valley, Bologna BO, Italy.
IAT, n.d. NOVI ARK ARCHAEOLOGICAL PARK, Modena Tourist Information Center, Modena, IT. https://www.visitmodena.it/en/discover-modena/art-and-culture/museums-archives-and-libraries/modena/novi-ark-archaeological-park
IMAFSF, n.d. Geographical Indications: Would you know more about GIs?Italian Ministry of agriculture, food sovereignty and forestry, Rome, IT.https://dopigp.politicheagricole.gov.it/en/le-denominazioni
Grande Giro di Modena 