Date: 26 March 2026 (Thu)
Time: 7:00 pm
Venue: The University of Hong Kong, Centennial Campus, The Jockey Club Tower, CPD-2.37
Language: performance in Italian with English surtitles.
Registration required. Click here to register.
Date: 27 March 2026 (Fri)
Time: 7:30 pm
Venue: Dante Alighieri Society Hong Kong, Room 702, 7/F, Hong Kong Arts Centre, 2 Harbour Road, Wan Chai
Language: performance in Italian with English surtitles.
Registration required. Click here to register.
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In celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Carlo Collodi, the author of The Adventure of Pinocchio, the Italian Cultural Institute is presenting two performances of Stories of Books: The Adventures of Pinocchio, written by Enrico Paci and featuring music by Tarek Komin.
Stories of Books is a reading performance that tells the story of the book through the history of the Paci Publishing Bookstore LA TIFERNATE in Città di Castello and the reprinting of great classics of Italian literature, with a particular focus on Carlo Collodi’s text The Adventures of Pinocchio.
The show weaves together narration, historical insight, and visual suggestions, guiding the audience into the stories, lives, and passions surrounding the making of a book: from the author to the illustrator, and finally to the printer.
The performance also brings along small elements from the exhibition connected to the project, integrating objects from the original period such as preparatory drawings, linoleum matrices, historical advertisements, and original volumes which become an integral part of the stage narrative, transforming the event into an immersive experience that merges word, object, and typographic memory.
Enrico Paci
Enrico Paci is an actor, director, author, voice artist, and teacher. He famously abandoned a career in law to dedicate himself to the performing arts—a decision he has yet to regret. Over the years, he has collaborated with various Italian theater companies and festivals, including the Festival delle Nazioni, Plautus Festival, Kilowatt Festival, Archivio dei Diari, Accademia di Brera, CaLibro Festival, and Epigraphè.
In 2016, he founded the comedic Shakespearean street theater company “GLI SCUOTILANCIA,” touring Italy aboard a vintage 1983 camper. Since 2018, as part of the .TA.NA.CE TRIO (alongside pianist Daniela Rossi and soprano Alessandra Benedetti), he has been experimenting with the “reading-concert” format. Notable projects include “Amadè, a biography of Mozart,” a semi-serious first-person concert-narrative about the life and times of W.A. Mozart, currently being adapted into an audiobook. He is also the narrator for an upcoming audiobook production of “The Adventures of Pinocchio.”
Since 2008, he has collaborated with the MEDEM company in Città di Castello, performing in approximately 30 productions ranging from prose and performance art to children’s theater, memory theater, and audiovisual installations.
Tarek Komin
Tarek Komin is a musician, composer, and writer. He has composed original scores for numerous productions, including “G.E.T. your colour” (Get Festival), “Era un bel mattino dell’8 maggio 1944,” “Buongiorno Signor Gauguin!,” and “Ricomposizioni, omaggio a J. Albers.”
For Atlante Servizi Culturali, he composed the audio guides for the Pinacoteca of Città di Castello and for the exhibition “Segno Forma Gesto – Works on Paper from the Collection of the Galleria Civica di Modena.” He is the creator of the workshop “Passi di Note – Learning music theory through the body” and has taught Theatrical and Musical Dramaturgy.
His most recent published books include: “Il giorno in cui ritornano” (Gallucci, 2022), “Il Primo Poeta nello Spazio” (2019), “Hiroi Kata” (Augh!, 2017), “Il Nido delle Tasche” (Bertoni Editore, 2017), “Emilio Seminci e i Giorni dell’Umanesimo” (Watson Edizioni, 2015).