{"id":38280,"date":"2026-06-04T18:13:59","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T22:13:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=38280"},"modified":"2026-06-04T18:14:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T22:14:17","slug":"italian-heritage-festival-in-full-swing-for-a-month-of-fun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/italian-heritage-festival-in-full-swing-for-a-month-of-fun\/","title":{"rendered":"Italian Heritage Festival in full swing for a month of fun"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

June is Italian Heritage Month and the community is coming together to celebrate the sights, sounds, and flavours of Italy through art, film, horsepower \u2013 and, of course, food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The festivities \u2013 Viva l’Italia: A Month of Celebration, Culture, and Community \u2013 kicked off at Aurora Town Square on Monday evening with the raising of the Italian Flag, followed by the opening of an art exhibition at Royal Rose Gallery, whose owner, Rosa Calabrese, is a driving force behind the event series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the second year Calabrese has brought the Italian Heritage Festival together, and has once again partnered with the Aurora Film Circuit, the Aurora Soccer Club, and sponsor Re\/max\u2019s Osborne Goddard Team, to make it a reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you missed the flag-raising and art opening, there is a packed weekend ahead with a Once Upon a Time, an activation with the Aurora Public Library, with a children\u2019s story time at 10 a.m. and an author reading at 2 p.m., and they will be back at Sunday\u2019s Aurora Street Festival with an art market, car show, and live painting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur first year was definitely a learning curve, as it was nothing I\u2019ve ever done before, or saw done in Aurora for Italian Heritage, so it was challenging, but rewarding in terms of the feedback and the engagement from the community,\u201d says Calabrese on bringing the Festival back for a second year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reflecting on last year\u2019s event, she says the film screenings hosted with the Film Circuit and the exhibition games and family fun day hosted by the Aurora Soccer Club really brought the community together \u2013 and they are coming back for more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve expanded in terms of activating other spaces in the Town, like the Aurora Public Library where we\u2019re going to have a children\u2019s story time with an Italian children\u2019s book and author reading,\u201d says Calabrese. We\u2019re also expanding the art exhibit, which is Seven Strong Women. We\u2019ve pulled together an amazing lineup of artists to bring their story and family\u2019s history of immigration and resiliency to the gallery. I\u2019m very proud about that one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor the Street Festival, we\u2019ll have four luxury cars parked in the Piazza parking lot (on Yonge Street, just south of Wellington) and we\u2019re back at the Street Festival with 10 vendor booths that have Italian product and flair \u2013 that will be fun, too!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Festival continues Thursday, June 11, with the Aurora Film Circuit\u2019s screening of \u201cThere\u2019s Still Tomorrow\u201d in Town Square.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe also have a fun surprise \u2013 we have a little performance by an Italian-Canadian opera singer, who will be opening the film,\u201d teases Calabrese. \u201cThere will be some fun giveaways for that one as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Aurora Soccer Club\u2019s exhibition game will take place Saturday, June 13, from 4 \u2013 6 p.m., with food trucks, children\u2019s games, and more. This is a free event \u2013 as is the Games Day back at the Royal Rose Gallery on Saturday, June 27, from, 10 a.m. to. 2 p.m., which closes out the Festival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Gallery will have different stations and we will be leading traditional Italian children\u2019s games and arts and crafts in an all-free event,\u201d says Calabrese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is definitely open to everybody. You don\u2019t have to be Italian to enjoy any of the events; my real goal is just to be able to connect with community members. In terms of the immigration story, whether you\u2019re from Italy or another country, you know somebody who has immigrated, what that process is, and how hard it can actually be. So, this is about developing that sense of camaraderie, that we really are all in the same boat, and respect for different cultures as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more, visit royalroseart.ca.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

June is Italian Heritage Month and the community is coming together to celebrate the sights, sounds, and flavours of Italy through art, film, horsepower \u2013 and, of course, food. The festivities \u2013 Viva l’Italia: A Month of Celebration, Culture, and Community \u2013 kicked off at Aurora Town Square on Monday evening with the raising of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":38281,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-06-04-07.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-9Xq","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-11 20:54:45","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38280"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38282,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38280\/revisions\/38282"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}