Mario Lodi: "Children's colours are festive, flamboyant, vivid colours"

Mario Lodi (1922-2014) was a teacher who left a significant mark on the history of Italian education and whose work continues to be studied by teachers in training today. His school journals (1963, 1970, 1974), and joint compositions with his pupils (1960, 1961, 1972) allow students of education to reflect on the practices he implemented in the classroom, as he learned to value the voices of the children and to flexibly and intentionally design his educational action, as well as documenting and assessing it. On 17 February 2022, we celebrate the centenary of Mario Lodi’s birth, a landmark that prompts us to rediscover his work, including portions of it that have received scant attention to date. A distinctive aspect of his professional career was his interest in children’s multiple languages, especially their expressive languages and use of colour. In 1989, Mario Lodi founded the Casa delle Arti e del Gioco [House of Arts and Play], while in 1992, in collaboration with the Galleria Gottardo of Lugano he staged L’Arte del Bambino [Child Art], which soon became a travelling exhibition and which successfully illustrated the importance of children’s artistic productions, from their earliest scribbles through their discovery of abstract forms of expression. This paper explores Mario Lodi’s contribution to the domain of colour education for children, based on passages from his autobiographical writings and projects that he conducted with children, which still today are viewed to be of great value and impact for contemporary didactics: colour as a medium for expressing feelings and a communicative force to be integrated into everyday educational trajectories.