A new exhibition center for national and international level exhibitions will rise in Lucca

In Lucca, the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca and the Fondazione Centro Studi sull’Arte Licia e Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti - ETS today announced the establishment of a new foundation, the Fondazione Centro delle Arti Lucca, which has the’goal of creating a major new exhibition center with an international vocation, which is able to organize high quality exhibitions and events, increasing cultural and artistic activities in Lucca and Tuscany and can enhance, at the same time, the city’s image both nationally and internationally.

The creation of the Lucca Center for the Arts is seen as the natural continuation of the collaboration between the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio and the Fondazione Ragghianti, which over time has made it possible to enhance the cultural legacy of Licia and Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti.

The two constituent Foundations will work in synergy by bringing together their distinctive competencies while fully expressing the purposes with which they already operate. On the one hand, the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca continues its commitment to social, cultural and economic promotion in the Lucca area, returning to the city a place of aggregation and dissemination through the recovery of a building that had been in complete disuse for years. On the other hand, the Ragghianti Foundation, a prestigious art research center, has expanded its reach over the years to become one of Italy’s leading and most active art foundations. From this experience comes the wealth of knowledge that the Ragghianti Foundation will also put at the service of the new institution.

The exhibition center will be the subject of a significant redevelopment, entrusted to the architectural firm Too of Reggio Emilia, and will occupy the spaces that once housed the National Cinema and the Manifattura Tabacchi after-work space: a property that, thanks to its central location and ample square footage on several levels, will enable the organization of attractive exhibitions and cultural events, while giving the public the opportunity to visit a permanent display of a selection of works of art from the collection of the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca.

To ensure continuity and full coordination among the institutions involved, the president and general manager, Alberto Fontana and Paolo Bolpagni, will continue in their respective functions at the Ragghianti Foundation. The Board of Directors of the new institution will also consist of Annalisa Zanni, former director of the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan, and Dario Cimorelli, a prominent publisher and cultural manager and member of various Italian museum institutions. The Scientific Committee of the Lucca Center for the Arts, again with a view to continuity and contiguity, is formed by the same professionals who already make up that of the Ragghianti Foundation, and who over the years have contributed to strengthening its prestige: in addition to director Paolo Bolpagni, Fabio Benzi, Martina Corgnati, Sandra Lischi and Davide Turrini.

“The constitution of the new Fondazione Centro delle Arti Lucca,” comments Alberto Fontana, president of the Centro delle Arti Lucca, “marks a very important moment for the cultural evolution of our territory: a far-sighted project that was felt to be necessary, and that fits into the city’s current growth path. We are confident that it will represent an additional pole of attraction. All this will only be possible with the involvement of the entire city of Lucca and its institutions, in order to build a unified project that represents the entire territory, combining the cultural aspect and that of the growth of quality tourism, which will bring added value to economic and commercial activities.”

“The path of regeneration that is about to begin,” says Marcello Bertocchini, president of the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca, “was born from a confrontation with the souls of the city, with the intention of going to create something truly new and unprecedented for the territory, allocating a private property of considerable size to an important function of a public and popular nature. The Center of the Arts will be a place of culture, but also a point of aggregation that is always vital, attendable in every season, open to contaminations and contemporary artistic and social languages. An adventure that will involve the whole city.”

“The Ragghianti Foundation,” says director general Paolo Bolpagni, “will continue its usual activities and programming, which indeed will be further strengthened, both as a center for studies and research and as an exhibition venue, according to the guidelines that have always characterized it. We are confident that it will emerge strengthened. With the Center for the Arts right from the start, we will get in touch with local, Italian and international institutions to build a successful project.”

Pictured is the building where the Center for the Arts will be based.

A new exhibition center for national and international level exhibitions will rise in Lucca

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