After the last class of the semester yesterday, one of my students asked us "what do you think about the Molino?"
I responded "Oh, it's great. I like that it's a counter-culture space right in the middle of Lugano."
The student kind of looked down and said "Oh...no...they demolished it Sunday morning at like 2am..."
Here is what it used to look like
And here's all that remains
If I can say anything about this town this whole thing is shocking but is not very surprising. Il Molino was an autonomous collective space that was occupied by the kinds of people that I'm certain were looked down upon here in Ticino. Punks, vagrants, squatters. One of the few positive memories I have in this town was when I went to a performance of a piece on Frida Kahlo along with a vegan tamale dinner. Another time I went to a screening of the wonderful film "La Mujer Fantastica" about an Argentinian trans woman. This was the kind of thing that went down at this place: interesting, unique, against the grain. I'm really sad that it's gone and angry that the conservative government here chose to demolish it in the middle of the night, probably to avoid public spectacle. There were folks living there that now have no place to go...
I just hope that the fight still continues
