The indestructible bond between art and the economy needs to be forcefully reiterated today, even at such a tough time for the global economy and for Italy’s economy in particular. One of the major issues besetting art, heritage and cultural assets today consists in the need to view them also as consumer goods. The market plays a crucial role in this connection, but at the same time it is going to be increasingly important for us to consider works of art as assets that can find a place outside the traditional museum circuit. Moreover, it would be a mistake today to cleave to the static distinction between artistic heritage as an “asset to preserve in aspic”, and its educational and social role in a dynamic sense. Art, inasmuch as it can never be anything but “contemporary” with the historical era in which it is produced, still has a role to play as a vehicle for man’s loftiest aspirations.
We need to rethink artistic heritage by transcending traditional values; in other words, we need to conceive of it also as “cultural output” and, on a more general level, as creative production that can be extended to embrace the broader environment which spawned by, and which develops around, artistic cultural assets. The risk we are running if we prove incapable of considering and indeed of measuring that added value, is that of being sidelined in a world in which creativity, in the sense of originality, is increasingly becoming the true added value. In light of this, we would do well to rethink our museums, too, as centers for the active production of culture, research and creativity throughout the country.
The public role of art – particularly because art and public life have always been seen as being very closely linked – demands government intervention, in terms which are currently the object of a debate regarding their redefinition. The relationship between a region and its productive forces is as crucial as the enhancement of intangible heritage, a battle which UNESCO has been fighting for some years and to which we must in any case assign a central role in all future action, but in particular with reference to the European Horizon 2020 Program.
The economic lever forged around art also envisions a new kind of audience and a new form of approach involving a broader and deeper awareness and, above all, a close bond with the media circuit. We cannot view culture and innovation simply as alternatives, we need to bind the former to the latter also in terms of their productive prospects. Yet we should not forget the image of excellence that Italy still enjoys internationally, a strong point which we need to cultivate further if we are to avoid seeing it weaken over time. We may still entertain the idea of selling off nonproductive cultural assets, but we should not underestimate the critical nature of the fact that Italian art’s appeal is very much linked to the old masters and to names that are easily recognizable to a globalized audience.