We are all linked by a single thread

Graduated from the Aldo Galli Academy of Fine Arts in Como, registered with the National Order of Restorers. Owner of Studio Maesani. A versatile professional with rare sensitivity, she ranges from restoration, renovation, high decoration, and the relooking/restyling of public and private spaces. Eclectic, brilliant, curious, in continuous search of materials/substance.

Milena, what cities are close to your heart? Why?

Since I was a child, I was accustomed to traveling by plane between Milan and Sofia. From the age of 5 or 6, my parents (and I will always thank them for this) would send me alone (with a tag around my neck) to Sofia, to the house of my maternal grandparents. We could say to my ‘grandma and grandpa,’ as in English it better conveys the idea, ‘great mother and great father,’ and not simply grandparents.

It is they who instilled in me the love I now have for art, music, and literature. All of this happened by fully experiencing Sofia for three months a year, with my grandfather Spiridon Tzetkov (Diado Spiro) and my grandmother Mariika Bungiolova (Baba Mice).

Grandpa worked in the administrative sector as an accountant for the “CONI” (Zentralen savet BSFSport – sportnata palata) at the Palace of Justice in Sofia (sadebnata palata), and for the central “Touring Club” of Sofia. He was a passionate runner, and early in the morning, he would take me running in the woods of Boris’s Park (Borisovata gradina), a wonderful place 50 meters from our house, and to watch the training sessions of rhythmic and artistic gymnastics champions at the sports complexes.

My grandmother used to take me to her offices right in the city center, where she handled administrative work for two publishing houses, Nauca e iskustvo (Science and Art) and Nauka e Kultura (Science and Culture), located across from the Russian Church, near the National Art Gallery. I would spend entire mornings surrounded by columns of books, and thanks to her love for culture, she often took me to concerts, the opera, and theatrical performances.

My uncle, my mother’s brother, was a university professor of mathematics—definitely a rigid man, but with an enormous and soft heart… I am like a daughter to him. Another uncle, Georghi Toshev, called Beni, was a graphic designer employed in the art world; he was the curator of the Sofia City Art Gallery (Sofiiska gradtza xudoscestvena galeria) and the Gallery of Foreign Art (galeria sa ciusdestranni iskustva). Being an artist himself, he often walked me through contemporary art exhibitions. Bulgarian artists have a unique, strong, and authentic expressiveness. This was the air I breathed.

Sofia is the city I hold in my heart. Always in search of change. Even though I don’t live there today with the same frequency as I once did, it holds the first place in my heart and mind. How could I not love it entirely, with its peculiarities and its contradictions?

How did your passion for restoration begin?

I have always nurtured a passion for drawing; I was inspired primarily by architectural drawings—understood as elements of cathedrals—in contrast to the drawing of hands and trees. I always had a pencil or pen, whatever was available, in my hands.

I always say that it’s not the medium that creates the work; if you have an emotion within you, it is that emotion itself that manifests. My passion for restoration was a consequence dictated by “reason.” With the support of my parents, I had the opportunity to attend the Aldo Galli Academy of Restoration in Como. But during my years of study, the Dean suggested and desired that I continue my “artistic” career as a professional, as a pure painter—in his opinion, I had something to say. In all honesty, I didn’t feel ready and I wanted to put the path dictated by my studies to good use.

My thought, and naturally my source of inspiration, is to be able to preserve (as long as I have the strength) what others have created before me.

When I restore and work to conserve a heritage asset, it is not just a purely technical intervention—which it must also be—but a fusion is generated between me and the work itself, an inevitable intrinsic understanding of it. In simple words: I absorb, acquire, and make my own energies that are transmitted, pass through, and transform. All of this enriches me and creates an exchange. In a few years, I will start expressing myself again through my own works.

What have your mixed roots given you?

Being born from a union between two different realities, even if both are European, has given me the possibility of always having a “refuge.” How can I explain it?

I just need to close my eyes to breathe in my intensely lived childhood: I experience Sofia thinking about flying there to buy a “banitza” with “boza” or going into the forests of “Vitosha” until I reach “Cherni Vrah” and drink the best tea in the world (my world).

Every memory I have carries a strong sense of belonging, the same feeling that then leads me back to Italy, arriving home and being able to eat a wonderful plate of spaghetti with tomato and basil, accompanied by a good glass of wine, and to recognize and enjoy the typical scents and colors of this marvelous country.

These are all the sensations I constantly feel the need to rediscover. Furthermore, the ability to know two such profoundly different languages allows me to find the right nuances of a thought. Often, the same concept expressed in one language rather than the other has more strength and truthfulness.

We are living through a difficult time. What would you like to say to everyone, Bulgarians and Italians?

I can say this: we must understand the difficulty of this moment and not underestimate the situation, and above all, not be superficial—let’s respect each other. These are simple thoughts; I don’t think I can talk about absolutism because every situation, every family reality is unique.

In your opinion, how will the world change after the pandemic, and what will it teach us?

While keeping in mind that we know very well that man (intended as a human being) has never learned from his mistakes, I still hope that a feeling that is latent for some of us will regenerate and be generated. I speak of the desire to want to know others, but not superficially. Understood as curiosity and the ability to start asking oneself questions. We don’t have to know everyone, but if we cross paths with someone’s life, we should try to understand why.

We are all linked by a single thread. There is an absolute balance above everything, and perhaps we should take that into account.