About
Since 1981.
Ivano's story.
Creation Art is a scenography workshop. But before being a workshop it is a person: Ivano Ferrario, who came in as a young apprentice in 1981 and has been inside Italian cinema ever since. This page tells how we got here.
44 years in cinema · one team · one craft
From leatherwork to cinema.
Ivano arrives at cinema through a side door. He had finished middle school — «failed twice, I didn't like school» — and had become a leatherworker. Five years sewing wallets and document holders, then in business for himself. Then the leather workshops start closing: «the craftsman was dying off».
«Through a friend I was brought in to start this craft I do now. I started at Cinecittà — Dino De Laurentiis, on a film we did ourselves.» Ivano Ferrario
In 1981 he enters as a young apprentice in the plasterers department. Five or six years later he is head plasterer. He is inside the production: a union of department heads — head carpenter, head painter, head plasterer — that forms for each film. Crews by craft, not companies.
Carlo Maggi. Mario Cotone.
The two decisive figures in Ivano's formation have two names. Carlo Maggi, head plasterer of cinema abroad, first — twenty years together, from when Ivano was twenty-three. Mario Cotone, line producer for Bertolucci and Benigni, after: Little Buddha, The Last Emperor, Pinocchio.
«Mario Cotone had become like a father to me, he cared for me more than for his own son. From him I jumped into the world of cinema, into the great films. From there we started doing beautiful things together.» Ivano Ferrario
Carlo Maggi teaches him the hand and the craft — the way to work stucco to the measure of the set. Mario Cotone teaches him how a film is managed: timing, budgets, patience with the production designers. «Carlo Maggi always believed in Ivano», he still says today.
Why Creation Art is born in 2000.
For nearly twenty years Ivano is inside the production — groups of workers paid weekly, department heads that form film by film. There is a structural problem, though: nobody knows what a scenography really costs. Productions see a head plasterer taking fifty million lire a week and cannot translate those numbers into objects.
«That's when we were born as workshops. The production gives us the drawings, we draw up an estimate. This costs ten, not nine, not eleven. It costs ten. That's how independent workshops like mine were born — from the need for a vertical company on this craft.» Ivano Ferrario · on the founding of Creation Art
In 2000 Ivano signs on his own. The first big film entirely from his own company is Pinocchio by Benigni, 2002: two teams in parallel, one in the workshops and one on location at Papigno. Since then Creation Art is the technical counterpart of productions — the one that translates a sketch into an honest estimate and into a delivered object.
The latex carpets for Tornatore.
One episode tells better than others how Creation Art works. Malèna, 2000. Giuseppe Tornatore wants to shoot in Piazza Duomo, Ortigia, Syracuse — the historical pavement cannot be touched, the cameras are heavy, the carriages would ruin the stone. The production stops the shoot.
«I invented the latex carpets. We make the moulds, we pour latex on top with fibreglass wool, it becomes a carpet. We covered the entire square of Ortigia with a fake period pavement, on top of which horses and everything walked. Peppuccio kept telling me: let's patent it, we were the first.» Ivano Ferrario · on Giuseppe Tornatore's Malèna
Since then the technique has become heritage of the industry. It allows shooting on protected surfaces — Rome cobblestones, monumental pavements, baroque squares — without damaging anything. It was born from a specific problem, on set, under pressure.
Forty-four years in the same place.
Ivano has been inside Cinecittà uninterruptedly since 1981. When asked what distinguishes Creation Art from the other two or three companies in the industry, he doesn't answer with technique — he answers with the relationship.
«When a production designer arrives at Cinecittà, he knows me from years. You trust each other. You manage to get inside the head of the production designer, you solve his problems without asking him a thousand questions. That is a winning weapon. If production designers ask at Cinecittà, they say: with Ivano you work well.» Ivano Ferrario
Between 2012 and 2014 Cinecittà goes through a deep crisis. Payments slow down, the industry's companies withdraw one after the other. Creation Art stays.
«It was a very critical, very bad moment. The companies had left, I was the only one remaining. I had to sell personal things to pay the workers. I have always been there in the bad moments.» Ivano Ferrario · on the 2012-2014 Cinecittà crisis
The workshop today.
The 1981 workshop was all by hand. The 2026 workshop alternates three capabilities: the CNC robotic arm roughing polystyrene at five times the manual speed, the Morbidelli N100 by SCM in the carpentry milling wood panels from vector files, and the hand sculptors finishing each piece before delivery.
- 01 3D Robot The CNC arm roughing polystyrene from 3D models — five times faster than manual sculpting.
- 02 Carpentry The Morbidelli N100 SCM and the plasterers' benches — load-bearing wooden frames for every scenography.
- 03 Polychrome portraits Full-round figurative sculpture — the only capability where the workshop delegates nothing to the robot.
«The difference between a workshop and an industry is simple: whoever walks in through the door cannot tell which piece came out of the robot and which was made by hand. When you can tell, we've done something wrong.» Ivano Ferrario · on the craft of today
Straccaletto.
In Italian cinema Ivano Ferrario is known as Straccaletto. It is a craft nickname, come from a long way back. At Cinecittà it works better than the surname.
«If you say Ivano nobody knows me in cinema. If you say Straccaletto, yes. When I went to do Little Buddha in Nepal, on the plane they had written: Straccaletto arriving. It's the same person.» Ivano Ferrario · on his own nickname
On the website we sign Creation Art — because it is the legal name of the company since 2000, and it is the name on which estimates are made. But anyone in the industry knows that behind it there is Straccaletto.
The dates
- 1981
Ivano enters the workshop as a young apprentice, plasterers section. He had come to film from leatherwork — «the craftsman was dying off, a friend brought me in».
- 1986
After five years he becomes head plasterer. He starts touring the sets as part of Carlo Maggi's team: a twenty-year, international, formative apprenticeship.
- 1990
«Little Buddha» by Bertolucci. Mario Cotone sends him to Nepal to do the stucco work. It is the beginning of a relationship that lasted a lifetime — «he had become like a father to me».
- 2000
Creation Art is founded. The founding is a technical response to a production problem: really understanding what a scenography costs.
- 2002
«Pinocchio» by Benigni. Cotone tells him: «the next film you do alone». Two teams in parallel — one in the workshop, one on location at Papigno.
- 2012-2014
Cinecittà goes through a deep crisis. The other companies leave. «I was left alone. I had to sell personal things to pay the workers».
- Today
Forty-four years of continuous relationship with Cinecittà. Three thousand square metres of workshop in the Roman Castles. Film, theme parks, exhibitions, brands.
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