La Foire de Saint-Ours: a thousand years of craft history

04/03/2023 - 04/06/2023

year 1000 is considered the year zero of the Saint Bear Fair. On January 30 and 31, for more than a thousand years, the center of the city of Aosta has been packed with artisans, who, today as in the past, display and sell their products. The Foire de Saint-Ours is a great festival dedicated to Aosta Valley craftsmanship that has its roots in the agro-pastoral culture of the past, but still attracts hundreds of thousands of enthusiasts of the manual art. This year's guest of honor was Alberto Cavalli, general director of Fondazione Cologni and curator of "Homo Faber," who was invited by the regional department that organizes the event. Also in this edition, the MAV-Museo dell'Artigianato Valdostano di tradizione proposed the "Oeuvre Choisie" initiative, an appointment that has been taking place for ten years now: starting at first light on Monday, January 30, Barbara Bernardi-Gra-Tonetti, the head of heritage protection, and Nurye Donatoni, the MAV's artistic director, identified among the stalls of the fair the works that, due to their characteristics, represent the ideal fil-rouge between past and present of traditional Valdostan craftsmanship. All the pieces are included in the museum display and exhibited to the public with a dedicated exhibition from March 4 to June 4, 2023 just inside the temporary space of the MAV. www.fieradisantorso.it www.lartisana.vda.it (ph. Paolo Rey)