Conservare l’intempestivo: riflessioni sulla vicenda del Memoriale italiano ad Auschwitz

Developed by the BBPR studio and sponsored by ANED, the Italian Memorial at Auschwitz, which opened in 1980, was intended as a choral and immersive work, featuring a suspended spiral covered in canvases painted by Pupino Samonà, paired with Primo Levi’s narration and Luigi Nono’s music. Since 2008, two projects have been launched to preserve the Memorial: the Glossa Project for minimal restoration, and the subsequent Glossa XX1 project (2010-15) for a more comprehensive intervention. These projects raised questions about what it means to restore the untimely: a monument designed to be inconvenient risked being domesticated. Deemed unsuitable for the didactic aims of the Auschwitz Museum, the exhibition was closed in 2011 and eventually relocated to Florence. The Memorial’s ability to challenge memory as a source of conflict remains a landmark case in the debate over the restoration of modern works. Following its removal, many memorials in Eastern Europe were demolished.