Testo in italiano

Artist Talk

Noemi Scaffidi, perfumes

“Art is a portal to the worlds that everyone has within themselves”

We are in the castle of Milazzo, whose foundation stone was laid during the Arab domination of Sicily, in the 8th century.

Right next to the castle is the beautiful old quarter of Milazzo and here we meet the beautiful Noemi Scaffidi, a talented actress and Sicilian artisan.

We climb to the top of the largest castle in Sicily, from where there is an enchanting view of the Aeolian Islands.

Hello everyone! My name is Noemi Scaffidi, I am 25 and I was born in Messina.

I am the co-founder of the Emomi brand.

I combine the business aspect with the artistic aspect; in fact, my training began at the Academy of Ancient Drama, I.N.D.A in Syracuse, continues at the Department of Modern Literature in Palermo and flowed into the creation of perfumes.

Our perfumes are a meeting point where different artistic figures come together to create an olfactory experience: painters, graphic designers, writers,  researchers in literary, master perfumers.

Our aim is to tell the story of Sicily through perfumes and these are our first three creations:

We have Donna Villa, Moresco and Sicalian.

We believe that the manual operation in creating a product is to bring back not only different quality and depth but also a primordial and mystical act, where Sicily is enclosed and imprinted through creative hands.

In fact, our master expert in  perfume has over forty years’ experience in the field.

And it is this experience that we want to bring back into the fragrances. Unique, which follow natural and never synthetic processes.

Our painter takes care of bringing back to canvas, after commissioned painting, the visual experience we are inspired by with our sense of smell, but which we realise with our eyes, because we imagine it first.

Here colors play a very important role. The copy of the painting is inside the box containing the perfume and the story.

Each perfume tells a Sicilian story, and each story refers to a different historical period and therefore to different perfumes. We were inspired by an Arab Sicily and a Greek Sicily.

Our group could not fail to have a researcher in literary in charge of putting on paper the story that the perfume is inspired by.

It is Nunziatina Bartolone who is here with us today.

“Our idea stems from the desire to propose a deeper knowledge of Sicily.

We have tried to combine the olfactory experience with the cultural one.

For example, for Moresco, which is based on our legend of the Moor’s heads, we went to the Kalsa district, which took us to 9th century Arab Sicily.

With Sicalian we took a trip to Greek Sicily.

And finally with Donna Villa, we went back to the Sicilian Circe, this woman who lived in these very parts, in a cave that attracted sailors and devoured them”

The research behind the creation of a perfume is long… it’s complex.

Yes, I’m in love! Of Sicily I like the cultural diversity, the great linguistic and historical super-layer on which we move our steps and our souls.

Cassata, cannoli from Piana degli Albanesi, cuccìa, almond paste are some of my favourite dishes.

The place where I play the best…I have asked myself this question as an artist, but as an actress it is when I am between heaven and earth and between earth and man, to quote Goethe.

I mean that there must be the human, artistic act regardless of whether it is radio, television, cinema, theatre …

At the age of five, I made my debut as an actress at the Greek theatre of Tindari.

In stone theatres, like the one in Syracuse that welcomed me, raised me and forged me, as an artist and as a human being, the stones speak, it is always beautiful to play there.

The last project? I directed Medea, which debuted at the Tindari Festival, ever present. Always present.

Always present because the human soul with all the demons we carry around with us that never gets old. A mother who kills her children.

Tragedy is sacred because it brings to the stage a point of view, no matter if right or wrong.

And through this also allows catharsis.

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Noemi on Sicilian Artisan Foundation: please, go

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The creative people of Trinacria

Sicilian Artisan Foundation (S.A.F.) is a project  to sustain the Sicilian creativity, over all to support the artisans and artists.

The objective of S.A.F is both to safeguard the traditions and ancient crafts of the people of Sicily, and to sustain economically the Artisans and the Artists, both the real ethno-anthropologists of the country.

The writers transcribing down through memory to the pen; artisans use their hands and flair.

Both use their hearts.

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Author: Giovanni Vallone, Cultural Department of Splendid Sicily

Translation: Giovanna Battaglia, Cultural Department of Splendid Sicily