From the south to the north of Italy to discover five projects that use street art to improve not only the appearance but also the quality of life in cities.
Naples, Rome, Genoa, Turin, Milan. Five cities that represent the heterogeneity of the national urban fabric, united, however, by a common philosophy: that of relaunching complex and often run-down areas through street art. No longer considered vandalism, this art form is recognised by residents, neighbourhoods and institutions for its social value, capable of rewriting – or repainting – the destiny of entire city areas.
Thanks to large and small, temporary and ongoing, public and private projects, street art interventions have emerged all across Italy, structured around the needs of residents, who are directly involved in the design, execution and promotion phases – for example by engaging in dialogue with the artists and hosting tours of their neighbourhoods. For an art that is widespread, democratic and participatory.
Painting walls is ultimately just an excuse to act on the social fabric.
Emanuela Caronti, member of the association Linkinart
Born from the early informal initiatives of its founders in the 1990s, the urban creativity observatory Inward has been becoming a reference organisation for the development of street art in Naples, the city where it originated, and other areas from the south to the north of Italy. As well as carrying out research activities such as Inopinatum, the urban creativity research centre at the Università La Sapienza in Rome, Inward collaborates with public and private bodies, non-profit and international organisations to carry out street art interventions aimed at improving not only the appearance but also the quality of life in some of the country's most complex peripheral areas.
Parco Merola in Ponticelli, a neighbourhood on the eastern outskirts of Naples – one of the areas with the highest rates of school dropout and unemployment in Italy – has been renamed the Parco dei murales, becoming a model of artistic regeneration and social renewal. The eight murals created by eight different artists transformed the residential complex into Campania's first urban creativity district, also visitable thanks to tours organised by Inward. The intervention was also social in nature, with the participation above all of young people from the neighbourhood, who were involved through interactive workshops and dialogues with the artists, with some depicted in the works themselves. A model that Inward aims to replicate and expand in another neighbourhood, the rione Luzzatti-Ascarelli, with the inauguration of the first work of the Rione dei murales in 2019.
(We want to) create a great social incubator that helps local communities to reflect on their own identity, their values and the contribution that anyone can make to the area.
With initiatives such as MURo, the museum of urban art, Hunting Pollution, the largest mural in Europe created with Airlite, and Outdoor, an interactive lesson and a virtual tour dedicated to the public art of the Eternal City, Rome has established itself as one of the world's cradles of street art. Big city life, created by the non-profit 999Contemporary, is one of the most successful projects in this respect. Thanks to the participatory public art formula proposed by the organisation in other contexts too, a block of social housing in Tor Marancia, in the south of the city, has been transformed into an open-air museum housing the works of 22 artists from ten countries, and was selected to represent Italy at the 15th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale in 2015.
"Il bambino redentore" by Seth, "Nostra signora di Shanghai" by Mr Klevra and "Ordine e disordine" by Matteo Basilè are just some of the works born from the encounter between the 500 families who live in the social housing of Tor Marancia and the artists. The project thus transformed a historic and one of the most populous suburbs of the capital into a cultural attraction of international renown and a must-visit stop for anyone wishing to explore Rome's vibrant street art scene. A museum that is always open and entirely free, which can also be explored through guided visits.
13 facades in the area of the Morandi bridge were transformed into large murals united by the theme of joy. In this way, the On the wall project by the municipality of Genoa in collaboration with the association Linkinart sought to give a new face to the Certosa neighbourhood, which developed beneath the Polcevera viaduct, which collapsed on 14 August 2018, claiming 43 lives. A national and local community tragedy, with over 500 people forced to leave their homes and many businesses that did not survive the disaster.
On the wall set itself the objective of rewriting the neighbourhood's reputation as a place of art and reconstruction. With the help of a team of 28 people also involved in the Civil Protection interventions following the incident, the artists took part in a true urban festival, creating the murals to represent the chosen theme – without mentioning the bridge – from July to August 2019, simultaneously with the demolition of the bridge, and completing them in time for the first anniversary of the tragedy.
The project is not merely symbolic, but represents an investment in the neighbourhood's future. In an hour's walk it is possible to see all the murals, and this itinerary has become a tour (the next is scheduled for 21 April) organised by Linkinart as part of Walk the line, an initiative dedicated to the rebirth of Certosa but also other parts of Genoa, such as the adjacent Sampierdarena neighbourhood and the pillars of the city's elevated roads.
I was very struck by a girl who said to us one day: "Yesterday evening at the dinner table, my family and I talked for the first time not about the bridge but about which mural we liked the most."
"At times surreal, and elusive, sometimes almost terrifying. Needless to say, we love it." With the words used by journalist Katherine Brooks to describe Francesco Camillo Giorgino, known as Millo, the Google Arts & Culture page dedicated to the Apulian artist opens. Millo was chosen to paint 13 façades in the Barriera di Milano district of Turin to represent the relationship between people and the city. The works were created as part of the international public art call B.Art – Arte in Barriera, under the Urban Barriera programme of the City of Turin, the Piedmont Region and the European Community, aimed at the artistic, cultural and social regeneration of the neighbourhood.
Completed in 2014, the murals in the "Habitat" series are even cited by the New York Times as one of Turin's must-see attractions, included in the list of 52 places to visit in the world in 2016 — a testament to the international success of an intervention that has redefined the aesthetic and cultural value of both public and private buildings in the Barriera district. Through a tour of the area, free maps and a dedicated school itinerary, the public art project has become a tourist attraction bringing visitors to a working-class neighbourhood in the north of the city.
Starting out with experiments in poster art — that is, the unauthorised flyposting of posters on buildings — Walter Contipelli "Wally" and Alessandra Montanari "Alita" developed their vision by founding an artistic collective that has transformed 15,000 square metres of walls in Milan into open-air canvases. Orticanoodles, a name that echoes that of the city's Ortica neighbourhood — their base and heartland — has carved out a new space for urban art in the Lombard capital, also thanks to the change of direction ushered in by the administration of Mayor Giuliano Pisapia (2011–2016), which, rather than clamping down on street art, chose to invest in its potential.
Starting from the enhancement of forgotten corners such as underpasses, Orticanoodles has created around thirty murals across Milan, including those of the "museum district" Or.Me – Ortica Memoria. An open-air museum, created also with the contribution of hundreds of young people, it explores various aspects of twentieth-century history — such as anti-fascism, feminism, immigration and sport — through the faces of the women and men who shaped them.
We want to bring artistic research into everyday life.
Alongside the social dimension, the environmental component is also strong. Orticanoodles is, in fact, the creative force behind Simply Electric, the first LifeGate Wall — a space intended to host messages linked to the protection of the planet and the building of a fairer society — supported by Opel, for whom the choice of a floral motif and the use of a "smog-eating" paint represent a vision of a sustainable and accessible future built around the electrification of its vehicles. The mural depicting a large peony has, in fact, given not only colour to Via Canonica in Milan, but also cleaner air, thanks to the use of Airlite paint, which absorbs the pollutants emitted by non-electric vehicles.