On the afternoon of 5th July 1933 the roar of 24 Savoia-Marchetti S.55 engines enveloped Reykjavik. The seaplanes landed in the city’s harbour and carried over 100 Italian fascists under the command of General Italo Balbo, Mussolini’s right hand man and mastermind of the expedition. One of the greatest feats in early aviation history, Balbo’s venture started off in Orbetello, north of Rome, with subsequent stopovers in Amsterdam, Derry, Reykjavik, Cartwright, Shediac, Montreal, Chicago and New York. In an era of pioneering, and often doomed, transatlantic flights, Balbo’s ambitious plan was intended as a departure from solo ventures depending on faith and individual courage; this spectacular voyage of military planes flying in V-formation all the way from Italy to the USA was the result of a methodical and maniacal preparation, merging sporting enterprise with war efficiency. Everywhere the aviators were given a rapturous welcome by the local dignitaries and the general public through parades, public speeches and grandiose gala events. Only in rare occasions local anti-fascists succeeded in partially disrupting the warm reception. Streets, harbours and monuments were named after Balbo in every country along the journey. Mussolini donated an original ancient roman column, taken from Ostia Antica archaeological site, to the city of Chicago, and to this day is on display in Grant Park, not far from downtown’s Balbo Avenue. US president Roosevelt personally welcomed Balbo and held a parade in New York akin to the ones that later celebrated the end of the war and the moon landing. However, with hindsight, Balbo’s transatlantic venture turned out to be a triumph of appearance that didn’t translate into a competitive and modern air force and ultimately was of no use to the fascist regime when the war broke.

My research into this historical anomaly is not a celebration of either Balbo or his aeronautical endeavours. It is rather an exploration of forgotten histories, of how contemporary society defines itself through selective memory and is a study into the cult of celebrity and how it overwhelms morality and decision making. During this past year I have explored the local histories that developed in and around Balbo’s path in Derry, Rome, Chicago and now Reykjavik. I have attempted to unearth narratives that have fallen between the cracks of contemporary societal and collective memory: the small, sometimes spectacular acts of rebellion, the broken hearts and humorous culture clashes, the testosterone fuelled myths of grandeur.

The paper planes in this exhibition, besides being a nod to Arte Povera, are also a homage to all the small acts of rebellion, and specifically to a group of local activists, the Young Communists, who distributed instructional leaflets containing a translation in Italian of “down with Balbo” and similar anti-fascist slogans. A few intrepid teens took it upon themselves to follow the instructions and shout those slogans to the Italian aviators, resulting in hilarious chases through the streets of Reykjavik. The idea of making paper planes occurred to me when I was researching Balbo related stories in Chicago. Egidio Clemente, an Italian anarchist who had been expelled from Italy by the fascist regime, carried out what is probably the most spectacular act of counter-propaganda when the 24 seaplanes arrived in Chicago on 19th July 1933. Having hired a small plane, he circled over the huge crowds that awaited the arrival of Balbo and showered them with hundreds of leaflets titled “Who is Balbo?” that contained a short article detailing Balbo’s role not only in Mussolini’s rise to power, but also in the murder of Don Minzoni, an Italian priest who opposed the fascist regime. Clemente also wrote and sent a telegram that, together with hundreds of congratulatory telegrams from all over the world, was read over a microphone during a gala dinner in honour of Balbo. The telegram read “Congratulations from Don Minzoni”.

In this past year I have uncovered many stories, mainly through interviews, archival research and chance discoveries. Here in Reykjavik alcohol seems to crop up in several anecdotes: from the special permission granted by the Minister of Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs to the Italian aviators, who were given a licence to drink wine “at any time of day” - to the Icelandic boatmen who, instead of refuelling the planes, as instructed, ended up drinking copious amounts of the spirit used by the aviators to clean the engines: they were found the morning after in their boat, inebriated and fast asleep. A recurring story corroborated by different sources, including Balbo in his memoirs, is the romantic rendezvous that one of the Italian officers had keenly organised after an evening of dances with one of the local young ladies, only to realise that the park where they met was an open field with no trees or hedges for privacy, and that at 1.00am in July they couldn’t count on the cover of darkness. Someone humorously remarked that after this episode the locals became keen supporters and advocates of the need to grow trees in the city. The rumours of an illegitimate Balbo baby is also a recurring theme, alongside the public reprimands that the local young ladies received from several quarters for being overly “friendly” with the handsome Italian aviators. Balbo donated three boxes of Italian peaches to the city’s officials: a very small gift, considering that every single one of the 24 planes carried a box of peaches from Italy. Obviously the temptation must have been overwhelming for the crew and somewhere between Rome and Reykjavik the sweet smell of ripe peaches must have been impossible to resist. I summed up a selection of these stories in the series of photographs with textual elements in this exhibition. The photographs were taken either in real or imagined locations mentioned in the accompanying text that I have taken from sources, such as Balbo’s memoirs of the flight and original historical documents. I have somehow re- elaborated the passages by eliminating punctuation marks and capital letters, although maintaining the original language in which they were written, Italian and Icelandic. During the course of the exhibition I intend to invite visitors to read the texts, if possible translate them, and create an archive of audio commentaries responding to the difficulty of reading and understanding these out-of-context fragments that are not only linguistically and culturally outdated, but also open to interpretation due to the lack of punctuation.

When the winds of history changed after World War ll, Balbo’s name was removed from the geographical locations that had previously been dedicated to him - in Reykjavik Balbo Sund was renamed Sundhof - and Chicago’s Balbo Avenue represents to day the only exception. Balbo’s transatlantic flight has now been relegated into our dark and unsung history, a past not deemed fit for celebration and a blemish that many nations have shrugged off their official history. Perhaps, and as a consequence of this and many other acts of denial, we might never learn from our past mistakes and forever carry on blinded by the cult of dubious personalities.

This project has been kindly funded by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.
I would like to thank Maurizio Tani, from the Italian Institute at the University of Iceland, for his assistance and patience in helping my research and for organising this exhibition.
Also thanks to Hildur Jónsdóttir for her invaluable contribution through her dissertation and her kind support. A special thanks to Gregory McCartney who set the entire project in motion.