Art and public space: a case of cultural regeneration

The complex problems faced by cities nowadays demand new planning tools. The urban changes, with the reduction of inhabitants and reuse of abandoned industrial areas, request also more participation in regeneration processes and attention to quality of life. In art too a process of continuous change is ongoing, the artwork are coming out of museums, there is more contact between artists and the public with a greater emotional participation. Currently artists are often involved in dialogue with the cities, entering in the urban requalification processes with a sustainable approach that put emphasis on the social process more then on the art objects. All that move towards an interaction among professionals with different skills to "make cities", creating relationships and opportunities for an effective dialogue. In this framework, the Manifesta art biennial interacts every two years in a different European city to offer "heterotopic sites of emergent cultural production". That was evident in Palermo where recovery and reuse of remarkable building and gardens gave a background to citizens and artists, but in particular to visitors to rethink together the City.