The Castle of Vigevano? For tourism minister Centinaio, it would be better if it were a hotel rather than a museum

For the Minister of Agriculture and Tourism, Gian Marco Centinaio (Northern League), Vigevano Castle should not be a museum, but should be turned into a hotel. An already much-discussed intervention the minister presented yesterday, July 23, at a meeting at the Castle of Vigevano, organized by the Pavia Chamber of Commerce together with the University, Confindustria and the Municipality of Vigevano. The topic was precisely the future of the Castle. “In my opinion,” Centinaio said, this structure must not become the classic container of paintings, sculptures and archaeological finds, as alas is the Castle of the City of Pavia, because it must be a living structure."

The minister added, “It has to be a much more living structure than the classic structures, the classic castles or the classic museums, the classic museum areas that are yes the home of culture and become containers, where those who are interested in seeing the exhibition, the civic museums or attending museum activities can come and fill their minds... but it doesn’t have to be just that, because I think that a facility has to be able to sustain itself, there doesn’t have to be just the city government putting in the money that’s missing from ticket sales, for whatever it takes to run the Castle. And consequently the fact of being able to do as it happens abroad, and if they do it abroad I wonder why we cannot do it in Italy, where important structures like these also become a meeting moment, an economic moment, places where the tourist can come and also have a hotel accommodation of the highest level, of quality and therefore to have the possibility to live in a conscious way and in an intelligent way in historical environments where excellent people who have lived in our territory and have made the territory great. And then to possibly have a restaurant, a bar inside this Castle, which was Gian Marco Centinaio’s dream in Pavia, a bar where the people of Vigevano, maybe the office workers, the people who work and live in the city, have the possibility to spend their lunch break, and to be able to maybe, in addition to being able to have their lunch break, also live on culture and ’intelligentsia,’ as someone says. The goal in my opinion must be to live off of promotion. Alas, our country, and I say this as an administrator, our country has always lived by preservation: we have the most beautiful things in the world but it is preservation, we have to preserve what was left to us by those who came before us, and so we continue to preserve, we preserve cultural spaces, we preserve castles, we preserve archaeological areas, we preserve, we preserve, but we don’t promote anything.”

Centinaio’s proposal, as one can imagine, was obviously rejected by Pavia’s superintendent, Luca Rinaldi, but these are important statements to understand what ideas an important member of the government has about culture.

The Castle of Vigevano? For tourism minister Centinaio, it would be better if it were a hotel rather than a museum

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