Bari's San Cataldo Lighthouse reopens with an installation by Francesco Lauretta

March 1, 2025 marks an important date for the city of Bari and the Puglia region, with the reopening of the San Cataldo Lighthouse. The structure, after a thorough process of recovery and enhancement, will resume its public function, welcoming inside the Lighthouse and Radio Museum, which will celebrate the history and fundamental role that lighthouses have played in guiding ships in the Adriatic Sea. This intervention was made possible thanks to the CoHeN-Coastal Heritage Network project, an initiative funded by the Interreg Greece-Italy Program 2014/2020, which involved the Apulia Region in the rehabilitation and refunctionalization of three lighthouses and three towers, destined to become focal points of a new coastal tourist itinerary linking the Adriatic and Ionian shores.

The reopening of the San Cataldo Lighthouse will not only be a symbolic act of recovery, but also an opportunity for reflection and creativity. In fact, the lighthouse will host the site-specific installation Bagnanti al faro ( Bathers at the Lighthouse ) by Francesco Lauretta (Ispica, 1964), created specifically for the site and premiered in conjunction with the museum’s opening. The environmental pictorial work is part of the project Lighthouses and Towers of Secret Fire, promoted by the Fondazione Pino Pascali and the Department of Tourism, Cultural Economy and Territorial Enhancement of the Region of Puglia. An initiative that aims to bring out, through art, a new perspective on some of Puglia’s most striking and significant places.

The art project Lighthouses and Towers of Secret Fire, curated by Christian Caliandro and Nicola Zito, involved six artists who, with different approaches and languages, interpreted the lighthouses and towers of Puglia as places of memory and potential transformation. In addition to Francesco Lauretta, Gea Casolaro, Serena Fineschi, Claudia Giannuli, Isabella Mongelli and Virginia Zanetti were involved. Each of these artists created an intervention capable of dialoguing with the geographical, historical and cultural context of the various sites, using languages ranging from painting to sculpture, photography to performance, video art to installation. The artists’ works were presented in the group exhibition Lighthouses and Towers of Secret Fire, which was held from August to October 2024 at the Fondazione Pino Pascali in Polignano a Mare, creating an important moment of sharing between contemporary art and historical and cultural heritage. The project attracted wide interest, both for the quality of the artistic interventions and for the intent to preserve and enhance places rich in history through creativity.

The San Cataldo Lighthouse is one of the central points of this project, but it is not the only one. Other places that have been the subject of artistic intervention are the Punta Palascìa Lighthouse in Otranto, the Torre-Faro Carlo V of Torre San Giovanni in Ugento, Torre San Felice in Vieste, Torre Pietra in Margherita di Savoia and Torre Calderina in Molfetta. Each of these places has received the attention of an artist who has been able to interpret their historical and symbolic importance, helping to make them even more central to Puglia’s cultural landscape. The reopening of the San Cataldo Lighthouse represents, therefore, a moment of fusion between past and present, between the tradition of lighthouses and contemporary artistic experimentation. With the opening of the Lighthouse and Radio Museum and Lauretta’s installation, the lighthouse becomes a symbol of a new vision of Apulian culture, capable of enhancing its historical heritage through the language of art.

Bari's San Cataldo Lighthouse reopens with an installation by Francesco Lauretta

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