Category: Updates

On March 19, the day of Father’s Day, in the setting of Villa Necchi Campiglio in Milan (donated to the FAI in 2001) the exhibition “Father and Son. Ettore Pistoletto Olivero Michelangelo Pistoletto” was presented, a dialogue between the artistic productions of Michelangelo Pistoletto with that of his father Ettore Pistoletto Olivero.

The exhibition will open its doors in three emblematic locations in the Biella area, three symbols of the candidate territory as a UNESCO Creative City: Palazzo Gromo Losa, a historic stately home restored and made available to the city by the Cassa di Risparmio di Biella Foundation, Cittadellarte – Fondazione Pistoletto and Casa Zegna. From Wednesday 17 April to Sunday 13 October 2019 each venue will host a selection of works, curated by Alberto Fiz, which tell the artistic life of the father and son.

Through the works on display and in the video-dialogues made with the curator and with Anna Zegna, President of the Zegna Foundation, Michelangelo Pistoletto has given expression to a non-unidirectional conception of the father-son relationship: leaving a legacy to the fathers, rather than entrusting it solely children the responsibility to communicate the knowledge and passions of parents. Father and Son presents over one hundred works including paintings, mirror paintings, installations, lightboxes, videos and photographs and is held in a very significant year for the city of Biella, which in 2019 will propose its candidacy to the Unesco network of Creative Cities, having its own Michelangelo Pistoletto as official ambassador for the project.

All information relating to the exhibition can be consulted on the website: www.padreefiglio.it

The candidacy of Biella to the Creative Cities Network is pointing the city at the top: here is a second nomination, the one to “Alpine city of the year“, recognition in view of the 150th anniversary of the CAI, in 2022.

Also in this case there is talk of an occasion for relaunching tourism and the Biella economy. Biella would be the first Piedmontese city to receive this award given to the cities of the Alpine area that stand out for their particular commitment to implementing the Alpine Convention and sustainable development.

In 2022 the works for the reconstruction of the historic system of the Mucrone Lake cableway should be completed – at the inauguration in 1926 it was the one with the highest mountain station (1900 m) in absolute highest – and the works could be started for the redevelopment of the Oropa basin with the demolition of the old anticima station and of the other “eco-monsters”, traces of a tourism development not consistent with the beauty of the places.

Last week in Morbegno, in Valtellina, the Assembly of the Alpine Cities Association was held and the ceremony for awarding the title to the Lombard town. The Municipality of Biella, with Councilor Riccardo Bresciani, delegate of the mayor to the mountain, participated as a guest.

Along with the success of #innamoratidelBiellese (over 60 thousand images published on Instagram since December 2014), a new social campaign to promote the area linked to a close relationship with Biella’s candidacy in the network to become a UNESCO Creative City is on the launching pad.

The new hashtag is just #biellacittàcreativa (don’t forget the accent) and the invitation, as for the previous initiative, is aimed at all photographers, professional or amateur, who like to share images of the territory on the web. In this case the theme is almost a challenge: to show one’s creativity and, together, the “know-how” that is the main ingredient of Biella’s candidacy for UNESCO.

The images posted on Instagram with this new hashtag will be published in the photo gallery of the site www.biellacittacreativa.it, created to provide information and news on the race of the territory for world recognition. A further step is the birth of the Instagram profile @biellacittacreativa linked to the campaign that will publish original content and republish, together with the official profile of the city of Biella, those created by users.

“The wish” explains Fulvia Zago, municipal councilor and “mind” of the Digital Agenda of Biella “is to repeat the success of #innamoratidel of the Biellese, which has helped to rediscover the pride of our territory in our fellow citizens“.

The UNESCO network candidacy is the result of the commitment of the Cassa di Risparmio di Biella Foundation and the Municipality, which is also a partner of the Digital Agenda projects. The logo that marks the campaign is the result of the creativity of Michelangelo Pistoletto who, with Cittadellarte, is in turn a supporter of the candidacy.

Milano Unica Shanghai will see the nomination of Biella as a UNESCO Creative City.

The fair will take place on 12, 13 and 14 March 2019 at the National Exhibition and Convention Center in Shanghai, within the framework of Intertextile. 46 exhibitors presenting the Spring / Summer 2020 collections to the Asian buyers at the Milano Unica Pavilion. At the entrance of the Milano Unica pavilion that will host Italian companies, the Unesco Candidature logo will also be on display, as well as within the catalog published for the occasion. A very important showcase for the whole territory, increasingly united under the sign of the “Third Paradise“.

Also the Cracking Art, the contemporary art collective born in 1992 and known throughout the world, participates in the campaign for the candidacy of Biella as a UNESCO creative city. He will do it in a concrete and visible way with an installation in Piazza Duomo and Piazza Monsignor Rossi of six of his flag sculptures, made of colored plastic.

These are giant  snails ‘chosen’, as the artists write in the project, approved by the Giunta in the session on Monday 11 March, “because they represent progress by degrees and in a safe manner towards a goal”. According to the six artists of the group (Kikko Cagna, Alex Angi, William Sweetlove, Marco Veronese and Sergio Nucara), there is also another symbolic meaning: «With his house the snail is associated not only with the domestic dimension but also with communication and, in Italy, to the symbol of electronic mail “. “The choice of Cracking Art to support us,” says the councilor for programming, Valeria Varnero, “is precious because their art has really crossed the borders, reaching the whole world. It is exactly the goal of our UNESCO candidacy: to give value to what has been done historically and continue to do in Biella ».

Cracking Art was born in Biella in 1993 with the aim of combining art with social and environmental commitment. The plastic, the material of which their works are made, has the property of being able to be continuously recycled and remodeled.

The six snails are also plastic, and from Monday, March 18 until April 1, they will find space in the heart of the city. It will be one of the 400 installations made in more than 25 years by the group of artists from Biella. Among these, those at the Venice Biennale and Central Park, in New York stand out.

Beauty, sustainability and comfort: three elements behind the success of the Biella textile culture in the world to which is added the technical perfection given by the widespread “know-how” of the territory: these are the elements on which the city aims for the ambitious candidacy to a place in the international Unesco Creative Cities network, the creative cities, in the Crafts & Folk Art sector, or manufacturing and popular arts. The official announcement was made on Thursday 11 October by the mayor Marco Cavicchioli and the president of the Cassa di Risparmio di Biella Foundation Franco Ferraris during an unusual press conference during the study trip to the university of gastronomic sciences of Pollenzo to which the Foundation has entrusted the preparation of a preliminary strategic document for the enhancement of cultural and immaterial knowledge related to the theme of wool.

“It is no coincidence that the announcement of the UNESCO candidacy took place during a trip,” explained Franco Ferraris. “It is in fact the beginning of a journey that will bring all the main players of the territory, whom I thank for being here today, to join together in a common path that will first of all rediscover the bases of our culture and the elements of excellence of the district as founding points of a new Biellese renaissance. With great conviction, therefore, the Foundation has entrusted a preliminary project to a first-rate partner such as the University of Gastronomic Sciences of Pollenzo and will support the expenses related to the candidacy ».

The visit to the Pollentina University was in fact organized by the Foundation to allow the representatives of the territory and the press to see in the field the extraordinary result obtained by Carlo Petrini with the application of the “good, right, clean” model to food and public giving illustration of the “wool project” prepared by the University of Pollenzo and illustrated by the former Rector Piercarlo Grimaldi.

“The city of Biella has adhered with conviction and enthusiasm to the Foundation’s proposal to advance its candidacy for the UNESCO network,” said mayor Marco Cavicchioli. “I believe in fact that today we need to look at the future more than ever together and try to imagine new scenarios, even ambitious ones, with the ability to start from our uniqueness”. Starting afresh from wool, a noble fiber par excellence, to tell about the know-how of a territory with a new horizon and a broader medium-long term objective that knows how to interpret in a modern and attractive way not only the Biella industrial excellence, but the beauty and liveability of the entire Biella system through the emotional narration of strong themes. The Unesco candidacy therefore fits into a wider territory project that aims to enhance the creative history of the Biella area, the mastery and innovation of the textile universe, in the circuit reserved for world excellence in various sectors of creativity“.

Carlo Piacenza, president of the Industrial Union of Biella, comments: “Being able to exploit the textile heritage of Biella as the Langhe has been able to do with food excellence is an important goal for the territory. Our District boasts a centennial business culture, unique in its kind, and a productive fabric of value, thanks to the “know-how” that links the past and the present; it is a district that has always made creativity its peculiar characteristic. It is therefore essential to tell everything behind a product, a story that represents a precious added value of our textile “.

The candidacy therefore comes as a movement of pride in a moment of great ferment for the Biellese whose main institutional forces are more than ever united to achieve important results that allow to re-launch the system coming out of isolation. The change of perspective is first of all cultural and leads us to see the Biellese from an external and broader point of view as an attractive territory for quality of life and well-being at the center of the Turin-Milan axis. In this context even minor realities can find new life in dialogue with the major centers in terms of services and cultural appeal, points on which the Biella is working intensely. “With this project the Foundation and the city of Biella take on a new horizon” explains Professor Pier Carlo Grimaldi who curated the “wool project”, “starting from their own roots they imagine a new future together and make a journey of memory and awareness collective, the first indispensable step to build awareness of the uniqueness of a territory “.

Once the candidacy has been formalized, the time will be very tight, in fact the proclamation of the new Unesco creative cities should take place by autumn 2019. For this reason, an institutional working group is being set up which will work to draft the candidacy that has been entrusted to Bia Srl, a consulting company in the cultural sector that has already taken care of several similar projects, including the winning bid for the city of Alba.