The AFAM Roadshow
Digital cultural heritage
WP3 | PHASE 1: CREATING IN ITALY
CNR ISPC and RUFA launch The AFAM Roadshow:
Research, Creativity and Innovation traverse Italy
The AFAM Roadshow – Research. Creativity. Innovation is a traveling initiative that, from April 9, 2025, will pass through seven Italian cities with the aim of promoting the dialogue between art, design, technology and Digital Cultural Heritage. Coordinated by the National Research Council-Institute of Cultural Heritage Sciences (CNR ISPC) and by RUFA – Rome University of Fine Arts., the project involves. Sapienza University of Rome and Italian AFAM Academies to explore issues related to sustainability, inclusion and innovation.
The Roadshow explores tangible and intangible cultural heritage through a multidisciplinary approach involving local institutions, students, and professionals in the field. With the Exploring Humans concept at its core, the event examines the relationship between matter and virtuality, tradition and innovation.
Through this thematic roadshow, Italy’s AFAMs, CNR and Sapienza position themselves as engines of innovation and culture, bringing the public closer to the richness and diversity of Italian creativity increasingly devoted to recovery, reuse, multisensory and multidimensionality and inclusion, in all its meanings.
A concrete and virtual journey through Italy with art, design, music and dance in all their tangible and intangible forms.
“The AFAM Roadshow. Research. Creativity. Innovation” aims to:
- Promoting the excellence of AFAM institutions scattered throughout the country through innovative forms of expression, especially through the digital and multimedia worlds
- Create opportunities for networking and collaboration among students, professionals, and the public
- Enhance the artistic, craft and industrial productions and creations of regional and local realities, including through the use of new digital technologies
- Reduce the creative “gap” between Italy’s center and suburbs by working with local resources and distributing visibility and tourist flow to alternative and creatively emerging destinations
- Expand awareness on the importance of art, fashion and design in contemporary culture for the empowerment of made in Italy
- Fostering inclusion and active participation in the creative and digital processes of diverse local communities, not only production but also mere fruition.
The AFAM Roadshow is part of the first phase of the two-year programming of GTA Grand Tour AFAM, an international project that promotes Italian culture and creativity through research and artistic production.
Exploring Humans
Exploring Humans celebrates the human essence through the dialogue between matter and virtuality, tradition and new technologies. Between places and communities. An ongoing tension between creativity and innovation. It acts as a bridge between past and future, exploring the multiple forms of human expression that define our collective and individual identity. Digital cultural heritage becomes a tool to connect emotions, the real with the artificially generated, revealing the human being as creator and keeper of experiences. Technologies become allies to preserve, reinterpret and share our universe of knowledge. Exploring Humans is an invitation to rethink our role in a changing world.
A format that engages students, the world of research, design, and entire communities
The AFAM Roadshow – Research. Creativity. Innovation thus represents a concrete and symbolic journey through Italy, in which CNR ISPC, Italian AFAM Academies, Sapienza University and local partners deepen the potential of interdisciplinary research and artistic education.
Through a format that combines lectures, workshops, lectio magistralis and exhibitions, the Roadshow stands as a traveling cultural laboratory, capable of combining tradition and innovation in a unique journey. Each Roadshow event includes:
Opening
Opening ceremony with institutional guests and keynote speakers.
Table Talks
Roundtable discussions among experts and experts in Digital Cultural Heritage.
Genius Academy
Lectio magistralis free of charge and by registration.
PopUp Show
Thematic exhibitions open to the public, featuring works by female artists from AFAM Academies.
Relaxation Area
Inclusive spaces for energy recovery and sharing.
Closing
Closing meeting dedicated to all the contents of the individual event.
A Hackathon
Scheduled in the final event only.
3 teams of college students will test themselves on heritage science topics, pitching their creative projects to a panel of judges.
Please be advised that in all spaces where the roadshow takes place, live streaming, video filming and photography may be carried out by authorized personnel for the sole purpose of carrying out communication, promotion and scientific dissemination activities on the ongoing public event, including portraying groups of people. The same images may be reused later for scientific promotion and dissemination campaigns by GTA partners, on institutional websites, in institutional social channels, in all official GTA communication channels, and by accredited national and international news organs always and only for scientific information and dissemination purposes. There will also be a webcam video recording system for live streaming on GTA institutional channels for specific moments of the roadshow.
Seven cities, seven themes for the future of Digital Cultural Heritage
From April to October 2025, the Roadshow runs through and inhabits seven Italian cities, seven scientific, artistic and social communities, with events including exhibitions, lectio magistralis and panel discussions.
In each city, a specific theme is addressed, related to Digital Cultural Heritage, the cultural heritage in which tangible heritage seeks to define its boundaries, its points of contact and overlap with the intangible and digital dimensions.
The keywords and themes that guide the individual cities, investigate the relationship between innovation and cultural heritage, declined into seven distinctive themes.
Ancona / Perceptions / Retro – Futurism
Pontedera / Visions / Design & High-Tech
Como / Dimensions / Visions, Scales and Surfaces
Milan / Emotions / Inclusive textures and colors.
Naples / Connections / Multiverses and Narratives.
Rome / Creations / Artificial intelligence and emotionality.
Florence / Human Heritage / Materiality and Metamorphosis.
