Arte e spazio pubblico. Una riflessione intorno ad un tentativo di "place making": il caso di Beyond project

Abstract

This article considers the capacity of art to ‘activate’ public space. After first recognising different ways in which art exists in public space and analysing its meaning - as a for depiction, as a space for claims, as a privileged space of relationships to be (re)activated - the text revisits the Dutch Beyond initiative. The project followed the development of a new residential estate, part of the Vinex programme, on the outskirts of Utrecht for almost a decade. It proposed art initiatives and events with the aim of building new awareness, encouraging relationships and above all it anticipated uses and practices in a public space which had not yet been physically constructed. It demonstrated essentially how art has the potential to work as a complex place making tool.