Starfinancer

The Angela and Luciana Giussani garden was inaugurated near Piazza Giuseppe Grandi in Milan. A tribute from the Municipality to the Milanese cartoonists who in 1962 invented the iconic character of Diabolik, who this year celebrates 60 years. The councilor for Culture Tommaso Sacchi, Mario Gomboli, director of the Astorina publishing house, Claudia Sozzani, heir of the Giussani sisters, Alfredo Castelli, screenwriter of comics and the writer of detective novels, Carlo Cappi.

“With this plaque we want to remember two exceptional Milanese women – says the commissioner Sacchi – Their Diabolik, who is still a timeless character and appreciated by an international audience, demonstrates the foresight and genius of the two authors in a historical moment in which the common imaginary linked to women was completely different from today “.

The choice to celebrate the two cartoonists with the title of a garden was dictated above all by their passion for open spaces. “This is demonstrated by their travels, and those of their character, around the world – explains Mario Gomboli, director of the Astorina publishing house that has published Diabolik’s stories since 1962 – I believe that if they were still alive, this tribute would gratify them more than any other award “.

The unveiling of the plate was also an opportunity to remember the unconventional story of the two Milanese sisters. “Angela, who would have turned 100 this year, was extroverted and rebellious – underlines Claudia Sozzani – She passed with ease from a gala evening driving an airplane and worked as a model first and then as a journalist and editor: in short, a profile of unusual woman in 1950s Milan. ” The approach to the world of publishing reaches the age of 27, when she marries Gino Sansoni, founder of the Astoria publishing house in 1946.

“Her sister Luciana, a few years younger, was instead a more rational and concrete woman – adds Gomboli – From her first jobs as an employee, in fact, she then followed in the footsteps of her sister, who in 1960 founded her publishing house Astorina”. And two years later they created the thrilling adventures of the ‘King of Terror’ (as Diabolik is defined): a villain – diabolical in fact – criminal who always manages to escape the law and, as if that were not enough, lives more uxorio with his blonde companion of adventures Eva Kant.

“Surely the great success that soon invested this comic, still today among the best sellers on the Italian market, lies precisely in the personality of its authors: two beautiful, cultured, witty and restless women who did not invent ‘only’ a series, but a their very own way of making comics, of thinking about it, of writing it, of managing it, of living it ”, underlines the director of Astorina.

Many citizens were present at the inauguration ceremony, who immediately afterwards moved to the Wow Space Comic – Museum of Comics in Milan in viale Campania 12 (which is located a few steps from the garden in the name of the Giussani sisters in Piazza Grandi), where an exhibition on the ‘Diabolike sisters’ was inaugurated, which can be visited until 19 June.