Luciano Lutring, ‘Il Solista del Mitra’, ‘nemico pubblico numero uno’, fuorilegge, e latitante (‘The Machine Gun Soloist’, ‘public enemy number one’, outlaw, and fugitive). At the end of part 1 we left Luciano at a turning point in his life … si era innamorato di una bella ragazza (he had fallen in love with a beautiful girl). But did his love for Elsa Candida Pasini make an honest man of him? No, per niente! (not at all). In fact, Luciano now had to ‘work’ a lot harder in order to provide Elsa with all the beautiful things that she desired … expensive jewellery, furs, e così via (and so on).

But his luck couldn’t last forever, and finally, in September 1965 he was injured and captured in Paris, where he had moved with his band of outlaws when things got too hot in Italy. Originally condemned to 22 years imprisonment, the sentence was eventually reduced to 12 when he was graziato dal Presidente della Repubblica Francese (pardoned by the President of the French Republic) Georges Pompidou. Luciano returned to Italy where, after a period of internment in the carcere di Brescia (Brescia prison) he was once again pardoned, this time by the Italian President Giovanni Leone.

During his years in prison Lutring had begun to paint and write, and it was these skills that finally enabled him to make an honest living. Here’s another interesting video of Lutring talking about, amongst other things, an exhibition of his paintings in a bank. At 0:45 you’ll hear him say “sai, ritornare in banca, che io una volta entravo in banca col mitra, oggi torno in banca col pennello” (“you know, going back into a bank, when once I used to go into the bank with the machine gun, today I go into the bank with the paintbrush”).

Click on the photo to watch the video

In the preface to his biography ‘Luciano Lutring, la vera storia del solista del mitra’ written by Andrea Villani in 2012, Lutring wrote:

“Nessun uomo nasce con l’etichetta di criminale. Ma a volte le contingenze, e anche le coincidenze, possono spingere chiunque nel baratro. Da questa mia storia si comprenderà che la fede e l’arte possono aiutare chiunque a uscirne e trovare la giusta collocazione nella società. Lasciando ai posteri, ma prima di tutto a Dio, il giudizio finale”

“No man is born labelled as a criminal. But sometimes unforeseen circumstances, and even coincidences, can push anyone into the abyss. From this, my story, you will understand that faith and art can help anyone to climb out and find the right place in society. Leaving to posterity, but above all to God, the final judgement”.

Luciano Lutring è scomparso il 13 maggio 2013 all’età di 75 anni (Luciano Lutring passed away on the 13th of May 2013 at the age of 75).