Underground worlds and Myth: fantasy and magic in mining and metallurgical art, by Angela Quattrucci
The subject of this contribution is the use of the fantastic and the magic in the world of minerals and metals; it is a reflection on the ‘knowledge’ related to metallurgy and the underground world, a symbolic and highly suggestive place, where myth, tradition and legend merge. The way these phenomena have accompanied the development of mining and metallurgical art is revealed in the horizons of knowledge of the natural world of ancient classical writers. The first speculations on the earth sciences, on the origin of minerals, metals and their properties were expression of the attempt to formulate a theoretical arrangement, still inspired by the myth and the occult. Afterwards, in the cultural context of the fourteenth-fifteenth century, those practices evolve from ancient and medieval metallurgy, showing the need for a new balance between theory, stripped from the strict adherence to the dogma, observation and experience. It was an attitude that later on will result in the ‘scientific method’, but that already in Agricola e Biringuccio finds a first real and important expression.
Keywords: mining and metallurgical art, myth, fantastic, magical-sacral prestige, alchemy
The Archeological/Mining Parks of Solivar, Røros and Falun: European experiences in comparison, by Sandro Nannucci
The decommissioning of industrial areas and plants, with the consequent abandonment of buildings and production facilities, started in the seventies of the twentieth century, has left behind a huge mass of material testimonies of a past that, however recent, has marked deeply, together with the landscape of entire regions, the lifestyle, habits and mentality of the communities directly involved in the production processes. The recovery, preservation and enhancement of the “industrial monuments” thus generated has become one of the strategic levers for the cultural revitalization of cities and territories, demonstrating how the adequate exploitation of assets dating back to industrial civilization can be returned to the public. as a collective cultural heritage. The examples collected in this contribution belong to three European areas that have been involved, in different times and ways, by the process of industrialization, homogeneous for techniques and practical skills, which has contributed to shaping European society in a meaningful way. An area in which metallurgy has played a preponderant role for the role, civil and military, played by metals in previous centuries. The preservation of memory and the enhancement of this cultural heritage, the models adopted to achieve them, the management systems of buildings and plants as well as the interventions, implemented at Roros and Prešov represent one of the most widespread approaches, while integrated forms of approach to the industrial archaeological heritage, as in the case of Falun, enhance and actualize the asset in a richer and more articulated form.
Keywords: Industrial archeology, Ecomuseum, Roros, Prešov, Falun.
The Philips’ industrial landscape in Eindhoven. Heritage and reuse of Strijp s terrain, by Dimitra Babalis, Irene Curulli
There is a growing trend towards the transformation of large industrial heritage buildings and terrains into desirable urban places through mixed-uses development and processes of co-creation. In The Netherlands, the innovative projects of regeneration undertaken by the city of Eindhoven in the last decades are of great significance. This paper discusses the relationship between the existing industrial landscape of Eindhoven and the related creative design of reuse, and it highlights the potential of vast architectural buildings and terrains that characterise the city, motherland of Philips’ electronic industry, which was based in Eindhoven since 1920. The authors illustrate the important role played by the industrial history of Eindhoven on the preservation and regeneration of a number of industrial sites and notable buildings, located in the inner and outer city, and will discuss the urban regeneration program adopted by the Local Authority in Strijp S, former Philips’ industrial terrain. The project of transformation is funded on sustainable redevelopment, preservation and reuse of industrial heritage. The paper examines: the importance of the master-planning processes and the gradually changing perceptions of Stijp S through creative reuse of old buildings and the development of new ones; it underlines those feature that show how industrial heritage can contribute to create dynamic places to attract local people and visitors, while creative industries can lead to the growth of local economy.
Kewyords: Industrial landscape, Industrial heritage, Sustainable redevelopment, Reuse and creative industry.
Industrial heritage of the textile company Algodonera Flandria. Re-enabling the heritage of a working-class town in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, by Mariela Ceva, Claudio Tuis
The paper is a brief summary of a work experience that had as central axis the preservation and conservation of local historical sources through the creation of a documentary archive and the creation of a textile museum. Both activities were developed in the property that for seventy years occupied the textile company Algodonera Flandria, from the town of Jauregui, in the district of Buenos Aires, Argentina
Keywords: Industry, Archive, Museum, Working Class Town.
Emigration, industrialization and labour culture: the case of Galópolis, the first textile industry in the Italian colonization zone in Rio Grande do Sul, by Vania B.M. Heredia, Giovanni Luigi Fontana
The study aims to present the relationship between working cultures of the nineteenth and twentieth century, between workers who left the city of Schio-Italy, and came as immigrants to the South of Brazil, carrying in their baggage a wealth of technical knowledge which led to the creation of a textile cooperative. The industrial heritage that emerges from these two cultures shows the strength of immigrant labour as social mobility, and ethnicity, as a link between cultures that talk to each other, stemming from the origin of their ancestors, who lived in a society in transition where the textile industry was a space of work, of “social status” and worker identity. The results of the study show the presence of two distinct worlds that intersect and that constitute the strength of the industrial patrimony that remain until the present day, giving life to this working village. Through oral history, the narratives of descendants of Italian immigrants who worked in this textile industry show the richness of this history that can be expressed by their patrimony.
Keywords: industrial patrimony, history of Italian immigration, oral history, working-class village.
Agricultural, mineral crisis and demographic desertification of the ‘fragile inner perpheries’ of southern Tuscany, by Giancarlo Macchi Janica, Graziano Mantiloni
One of the noteworthy aspects of Italy’s recent history is the depopulation that from early fifties of the twentieth century, has invested a part of the rural areas of the peninsula. These are territories with small communities that, between 2001 and 2011, continued to register decreases in the number of residents that in many cases exceed 10% of the population. This paper describes an analysis that at a micro-territorial scale aimed to the identification of the recent population history of the towns of Roccalbegna and Semproniano in southern Tuscany, two of the municipalities most affected by rural depopulation process. The study presented in these pages highlighted how the drastic process of population decrement is articulated in phases that are strictly dependent on changes in economic and technological progress. The crisis of mining and agriculture, has determined a decline that pushed families to search for new chances elsewhere.
Keywords: Inner Peripheries, Population History, Historical Landscapes, Geography.
The Art of Blacksmiths in Florence and in its earldom through the analysis of statutes and matricole (1344-1481), by Simone Picchianti
The study of most of the Florentine Arti Minori, has aroused until today, a scarce interest by the scholars. This first survey, concerning the Arte dei Fabbri (Art of Blacksmiths) in Florence and its countryside. between the end of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, based on the analysis of the statute and the matricole, shows the great importance of this economic and productive sector in the reality of that time. Particular attention is paid to the structure of this (work specializations, access modalities), to the production of artefacts and to the activities carried out, as well as to the general trend in the chronological period examined.
Keywords: Blacksmiths, Handicraft, Weapons, Florence, Earldom
