Arte in facciata: le decorazioni pittoriche e scultoree nei processi di trasformazione urbana ed architettonica

Within the complex phenomena of reconstruction and restoration of buildings that accompany the processes of urban transformation, the external pictorial and sculptural decorations play a role of great importance. The facades, as liminal surfaces, denounce both the intended uses and the political, social and cultural implications that accompany the functions of the buildings, also communicating the requests, claims, ambitions of the owners and users (individuals, groups, communities or institutions). For these reasons, they are the witnesses of continuity of use and persistence of values, or the expression of new meanings and life styles. At the same time, the facades represent the scenic backgrounds of urban perspectives, but also of religious, civic and cultural events, and as such they are called to adapt to more general urban renewal plans: they are, therefore, often expected to support needs in a certain sense ‘imposed’ by the use of the spaces outside them. Both in large cities and in small towns, the transformations of the façades are conducted as a spontaneous enterprise focused on the single monument or are planned on the wide urban scale, sometimes after dramatic events (wars, earthquakes, etc.). Documented only by written sources or sometimes also by material traces, changes and transformations represent an eloquent ‘manifesto’ of the processes of the historical memory, of the dynamics that accompany them, of the social instances and cultural impulses that determine them. The essays of this session analyse a wide range of cases in different chronological and geographical contexts, which reveal the role played by the façade decorations and related transformations as an expression and representation of the human and material history of the cities and of their spaces. The theme of the session falls within the area of interest of the the project Memory and identity. Reuse, reworking and rearrangement of the Medieval sculpture in the Modern Age between historical research and new technologies, FISR 2019_05012.