Rome, Italy's ecosystems and biodiversity in an exhibition at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni

Until March 30, 2025, the Palazzo Esposizioni in Rome presents In Praise of Diversity. Journey in Italian Ecosystems, a major exhibition project dedicated to the theme of biodiversity and unique health that addresses the fragility of the balance between ecosystems, the interdependence between the different forms of life on our planet, to activate forms of individual and collective responsibility.

The exhibition, promoted by theDepartment of Culture of Roma Capitale andAzienda Speciale Palaexpo, is curated by Sapienza University of Rome with University of Padua and the National Biodiversity Future Center (NBFC), established by the National Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PNRR): one of five national centers dedicated to frontier research that carries out work of strategic importance with a view to helping achieve the goals of theUnited Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Carabinieri Biodiversity Regiment and theDepartment of Agriculture, Environment and Waste Cycle of Roma Capitale contributed to the exhibition.

The exhibition, curated by Isabella Saggio, geneticist, professor at the Department of Biology and Biotechnology “Charles Darwin” of Sapienza University of Rome, and Fabrizio Rufo, bioethicist, professor at the Department of Environmental Biology of Sapienza University of Rome, with the involvement of the best biodiversity experts in Italy and the contribution of the more than two thousand researchers of the National Biodiversity Future Center, describe the fundamental role of research in studying, preserving and restoring our country’s natural heritage. Biologists, naturalists, geneticists, anthropologists, ecologists, urban planners, architects, and artists have offered their valuable contributions and expertise to comprehensively recount such a complex topic.

The exhibition is supported by a scientific committee of excellence and international level, composed of Nobel Laureate Giorgio Parisi, Enrico Alleva, Carlo Blasi, Stefano Boeri, Ferdinando Boero, Maria Chiara Carrozza, Luigi Fiorentino, Enrico Giovannini, Vittorio Lingiardi, Antonella Polimeni, and Ling San.

A journey through Italy’s biodiversity

In Praise of Diversity is a journey into the diversity of our country. The beauty and importance of biodiversity are recounted through a mixture of languages in which scientific rigor and aesthetic suggestion, explanation and emotion are blended. The synthetic textual narrative dominated by the contemplation of exciting and often unpublished original finds is enriched by videos, iconographic apparatus and reconstructions.

Contributing to this immersion is the installation designed by Marisa Coppiano Maison and created by Opera Laboratori. The audience is thus immersed in the richness of the terrestrial and marine environments as in a fairy tale, surrounded by the “marvelous overbearingness” of nature with huge animals and plants, corals and giant starfish.

Immersive films made by Punto Rec Studios, with the composition and performance of soundtracks composed specifically for the exhibition, offer an additional sense of wonderment by taking visitors inside the veins of a leaf, on the wings of an insect and into the depths of the Mediterranean Sea.

In addressing the different themes, the layout also changes, emphasizing the differences between natural, urban and genetic biodiversity. Real narrative contexts, which help to understand the “different diversities.” In the exhibition, the public becomes an active protagonist of the visit through the use of interactive digital exhibits, designed by Limiteazero, which allow for an in-depth exploration of some essential themes, such as the impact of our species on the planet and on biodiversity, where personal reflection becomes fundamental.

Among the ways in which Italian biodiversity is illustrated are many historical taxidermies and rare exhibits from science museums throughout Italy, including a great white shark and a monk seal from the Museum of Natural History in Genoa, a Marsican bear and agolden eagle from the Civic Museum of Zoology in Rome, a torpedo fish from the Museum of Natural History in Pavia, and a great sunfish and a wolf from the Museums of Comparative Anatomy and Zoology of Sapienza University of Rome.

The extremely rich variety of species is presented through evocative installations somewhere between science and art: collections of insects (Museum of Zoology, Sapienza University of Rome), crustaceans(Anton Dohrn Zoological Station in Naples) and in vitro preparations (Civic Museum of Zoology in Rome, Herbarium Museum of Sapienza, Anton Dohrn) are interwoven with zoological reconstructions by artist Lorenzo Possenti, “sculptor of nature,” and the site-specific work Otto miliardi by artist Manuel Felisi. The exhibition also tackles the theme of the genetic biodiversity of Italians starting with prehistory: on display is the original of the famous Maiella man, actually a woman from one of the earliest communities of farmers and ranchers who arrived in Italy around 6,000 B.C., lent by the Museum of Anthropology at Sapienza University.

The variety of foods and materials that nature offers us is illustrated by a collection of fruit models made and hand-painted in the 19th century by Francesco Garnier Valletti(Museo della Frutta “Francesco Garnier Valletti” and Accademia di Agricoltura in Turin) and by two guitars made, between the 18th and 19th centuries, from woods and other valuable natural materials(Museo Nazionale degli Strumenti Musicali in Rome).

Accompanying the exhibition is a rich cultural program to offer the public new experiences and insights: in the Auditorium Hall of Palazzo Esposizioni Roma, a series of meetings with free admission leads to the discovery of the crucial role of biodiversity for the ecosystem and human life, crossing urban forests, oceans and places desertified by climate change, in the company of experts in the field, in an attempt to respond all together to the challenges that nature poses to us.

While the Cinema Hall offers the free admission film festival Who’s Afraid of Nature?, which focuses on emotions, such as anxiety and a sense of helplessness, aroused by traumatic changes in the natural environment. A journey from fear of the foreignness of nature to an experience of listening and symbiosis, through the gaze of Hitchcock, Herzog and other contemporary filmmakers, which is introduced by a reflection on Ecology, ecoanxiety and the mind-environment by psychoanalyst and academic Vittorio Lingiardi.

The exhibition, whose theme is of absolute interest particularly for the younger generation, has been given a specific proposal for schools of all levels, with ad hoc guided tours and workshops, co-designed with experts in science education in the museum setting.

For all information, you can visit the official website of Palazzo Esposizioni.

Rome, Italy's ecosystems and biodiversity in an exhibition at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni

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