Let’s give a future to our past

 

‘The exhibition to be presented in Rimini has a forebear in the event called “National Trust-FAI: experiences compared”, a complex event held in Rome, at the Palazzo Barberini, in 1984. Its focal point was a photographic exhibition comprising 152 panels with large colour photos, texts and graphic indications of the building heritage saved in the UK by the prestigious Trust and in Italy by the FAI, then so young that it was able to produce only 19 panels. More than a comparison, it was an invitation to Italians to follow in the footsteps of such widespread success in Great Britain, and to proudly tread, albeit at a distance, the same road. The exhibitions in Rome and then Milan, Genoa and Bologna taught the Italians that the acquisition by the FAI of cultural and environmental assets through donations, inheritance, purchase and free loan placed at least part of the enormous Italian heritage safely away from the dangers of speculation, abandonment and neglect. With great confidence, increasingly larger numbers of people joined the Foundation (today they are almost 30,000). In fact, immediately after the Bologna ’86 event where the two latest magnificent donations were presented (San Fruttuoso and the Castle of the Manta), numerous visitors already began to express the opinion that the FAI should go ahead with an exhibition of its own and present all its latest acquisitions and newly restored buildings, a sort of account of the state of art. These acquisitions are undoubtedly the most tangible aspect of FAI’s growth. But we must not be content with quantity. The quality of FAI activities is reflected by the restoration work which lastingly restores to these Assets a lost or at least dimmed dignity and opens them up to the public who soon feel them theirs and visit them regularly – especially, the many events, at various levels, which are staged in them. Today the number of visitors is around 200,000 every year. “Let’s give a future to our past” has also provided prompt documentation of such work (restorations and extraordinary and routine maintenance). The exhibition presents panels with photographs and illustrative texts, both general and detailed.’

Date

18 Agosto 1996 - 24 Agosto 1996

Edition

1996
Category
Exhibitions Meeting Exhibitions

Curatori