Ludovica Purini Recieves Venere Award for Music

On International Women’s Day 2012, the City of Rome bestowed the Venere Award on 20 leading women whose contributions across social, artistic and political spheres improve the City’s culture, health and wellness. Among them, Ludovica Rossi Purini, President of Compagnia per la Musica and frequent collaborator with the Italian Academy Foundation, received recognition for her dedication to music. “I have always loved art in all forms, and believe that education and culture are the most important engines of social and economic progress.” Her preferred form of art, music, she said, “is a universal language capable of speaking simultaneously and with equal intensity to the intellect and the emotions.” Well-known for her weekly evening salon concerts in Rome, Purini considers music an important mode of communication on all levels. Her foundation concentrates on using music to address issues such as peace, poverty and racism through organizing musical performances and community participation to “suffering and needy” places where music rarely reaches, such as prisons.