Idanna Pucci

Since leaving her ancestral home in Florence, Italy, Idanna Pucci pursued her interest in diverse cultures through far-flung journeys. In New York, she worked for her uncle, fashion designer Emilio Pucci, who introduced her to Indonesia through his work inspired by Bali
and Java. She then settled in Bali and pursued her research on myth and the oral tradition.
During her Comparative Literature studies at Columbia University, she wrote The Epic of
Life, a classic on Balinese culture. Among her documentaries, “Eugenia of Patagonia”
recounts the life of her aunt who founded a town at the end of the world in Chile, and
served as its legendary mayor for thirty years; “Black Africa White Marble”, inspired by her
book Brazza in Congo: A Life and Legacy, sheds light on Western Africa’s colonial past and
its troubled present.
She is also the author of The Lady of Sing: an American Countess, an Italian Immigrant,
and their Epic Battle for Justice in New York’s Gilded Age, the story of her American great-
grandmother who launched the first campaign against the death penalty in 1895 to save the
first woman sentenced to the electric chair, a twenty-year old Italian immigrant.
Her book, The World Odyssey of a Balinese Prince, is a collection of daring adventures
that transcend borders. She co-authored her most recent book, Emilio Pucci: The Astonishing Odyssey of a Fashion Icon, with her husband, Terence Ward, with whom she
resides in Florence.