Less than half an hour northwest of Naples lies the charming coastal town of Pozzuoli, known for its volcanic scenery and numerous Roman sites, as well as being the birthplace of actor Sophia Loren. Still, it remains largely undiscovered by Italian tourists, much less international ones. For five days earlier this month (10-14 September), a mini-biennial organised by international commercial galleries and curated by the director of the Centre Pompidou-Metz, Chiara Parisi, changed that.
The theme for this year’s Panorama, as the annual roving exhibition is titled, was deification; in Pozzuoli, “not an abstract concept”, Parisi says, describing the town and its surrounding scenery as “a divine land”. Pozzuoli was founded as an ancient Greek colony in 531 BC and the Phlegraean Fields are both Greek and Roman. “As such, it is one of the most important Mediterranean territories,” Parisi says. “I believe anyone living in daily cohabitation with a volcano develops a different psychology. The thread of deification runs naturally in Pozzuoli: it speaks of the Sibyl, of Virgil, of Sophia Loren! But also, of everyone living their daily lives in this land.”
Works by 47 artists represented by 45 galleries were installed throughout the town, in Ancient and modern spaces including a former cinema named after Loren, the Church of Purgatorio and the Sedile dei Nobili where Simon Starling had created a work inspired by Caravaggio’s Beheading of John the Baptist (1608), which the Baroque artist painted in Naples.
In the Flavian Ampitheatre—the third largest in Italy and with a fraction of the tourists of the Colosseum—were bronze sculptures by Simone Fattal that mirrored nearby Roman statues. A sound piece by Clarissa Baldassari, inspired by glossolalia (speaking in tongues), echoed through the underground chambers of the amphitheatre. A short car ride away is the archaeological park Cuma, which was the centre for the cult of Aphrodite (Venus) as well as home to temples dedicated to Artemis (Diana) and Jupiter. Installed at the end of a cavernous structure among the ruins was a film by William Kentridge.
William Kentridge's film Sibily (2020) shown in the Cuna archaeological park
Courtesy of the artist and Galleria Lia Rumm
Lorenzo Fiaschi, a founder and director of the Tuscan Continua Gallery and the president of Italics, the consortium of galleries behind Panorama, founded during the pandemic as a way of supporting artists, says that Pozzuoli is not only a place that hosts art, “it challenges it, provokes it, gives it meaning”. He points to the area’s delicate geographical nature; bradyseism, which means “slow movement”, raised Pozzuoli by two metres in the 1980s, leading to the evacuation of 40,000 people from the Rione Terra neighbourhood. The phenomenon continues to raise the ground across the Phlegraean Fields today.
But Rione Terra, which has only recently been restored, could provide a new lease of life for Pozzuoli—and culture is likely to play a part. A group of stakeholders including the diocese of Pozzuoli; the Archaeological Park of Campi Flegrei; and the Superintendency of Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape for the Metropolitan Area of Naples is currently drawing up an agreement to manage Rione Terra.
According to a statement from the Municipality of Pozzuoli, “The main goal of the agreement is to strengthen and expand public policies for the conservation and enhancement of the Rione Terra. In this way, it aims to foster the cultural and social recovery of the entire complex.” To achieve these goals, a committee will be established. “This body will be responsible for drafting a detailed strategic plan for cultural development, setting out the guidelines and framework for programming both temporary and permanent cultural activities to be carried out in the designated buildings,” the statement says. It is understood galleries might apply to occupy some of the spaces in the neighbourhood.
If the aim of Panorama is to activate less well-known or undiscovered places in Italy (other iterations have taken place in Procida and Monferrato among other locations), then it seems its legacy may contribute to the cultural revival of Pozzuoli, too. As Parisi puts it: “The greatest triumph has been to see people from Naples and elsewhere in Campania coming to rediscover places they hardly knew—and all through art.”
