Treviso, project is studied for the preservation of street art works

Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, with its experts in the field of Heritage Conservation Science, has signed an agreement with The Wallà project for the study and conservation of the murals created as part of the project, in the province of Treviso. This project aims to protect street art works from damage caused by time and weathering

The issue of street art conservation first emerged on a mainstream level with the murals of Keith Haring. The works of the famous American street artist, who died prematurely, were saved thanks to the efforts of scientists at the University of Pisa. Currently, in Italy, the conservation of contemporary wall paintings is a complex challenge. These paintings are often made of synthetic materials chosen for artistic reasons rather than for their durability, leading to problems such as color variations and paint detachment. The challenge is therefore to understand how they are composed in order to best preserve them.

For more than a decade, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, led by Professor Francesca Izzo, has been studying street art materials to understand their behavior over time and develop guidelines for their conservation. In collaboration with the association Collettivo Bocaverta APS, the Municipality of Riese Pio X, and Ca’ Foscari, a memorandum of understanding was initiated as part of the fourth season of The Wallà project. The hamlet of Vallà in the Municipality of Riese Pio X, a location where a community of three thousand people live and crossed daily by thirty thousand vehicles, is the chosen place for this pilot project. In the past four years, Vallà has seen the creation of 17 murals, attracting thousands of tourists and contributing to urban regeneration. Internationally renowned artists such as EricailCane, Stenlex, Millo and Agostino Iacurci have left their mark on the town’s walls. The project will send teams of professionals during the creation of the next murals, scheduled for this summer. Artists involved include Tellas and Pixel Pancho in June, Franco Fasoli in July, and Joys and Orion in September.

“The Wallà thus becomes a pilot project not only for urban regeneration, but also in the area of conservation and preservation of outdoor murals,” explains Samuele Stocco, secretary of the Bocaverta APS Collective, which promotes The Wallà project. “We are experiencing how much time and environmental conditions deteriorate street art, so the implementation of good conservation practices is necessary for the purpose of maintaining the murals created.”

“As part of the collaboration with The Wallà and the Municipality of Riese Pio X we will carry out diagnostic campaigns, also involving students who are training to become scientific experts in the field of Conservation,” explains Franca Izzo. “The goal will be to study the materials used by the artists and to evaluate conservation and maintenance strategies, which are often also useful from an economic point of view: it costs less to defend art than to restore it when it is severely degraded. We will come up with theses for the Master’s degree in Conservation Science and Technology for Cultural Heritage and in the three-year degree in Science and Technology for Cultural Heritage: we will study the chemical and physical mechanisms of degradation and evaluate solutions. Saving murals will be increasingly necessary in the future; we want to train the generation of conservation scientists who will save street art from the oblivion of time.”

Treviso, project is studied for the preservation of street art works

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