qwatz – contemporary art platform collaborates, as external consultant, in the second edition of Magic Carpets Italia, a four-years residency project for artists by Latitudo Art – Projects, co-financed by the Creative Europe Large Scale Program, which involves 13 European partners.
As first resident of this edition, the Swiss artist Yves Mettler studies the housing policies of the beginning project (1970s – 1980s) and the urban and social evolution of the Laurentino 38 area, a suburb of Rome, involving children and young people in workshops to create a storyboard that tells the area through their experiences and their vision of the future.
The Laurentino 38 is a suburb of Rome: 28 thousand inhabitants in 6 thousand apartments. There are no post offices or banks, public transport services are very scarce, there is no space for aggregation. Adults have recourse to economic assistance, the poverty of the elderly is higher than the municipal average, the rate of school dropout in the age of obligation is very high. Each unit of the Laurentino 38 is isolated and recognizable from the so-called “bridges”, designed to house the services and commercial activities and, on contrary, occupied illegally.
Yves Mettler works in Berlin. His research path explores the social meaning of public squares and buildings, going beyond their practical function. Mettler uses sign semantics, new media, photography, graphics and installation. The artist allows different architectural models to communicate with each other, making the text and sound works interact.
Image: Yves Mettler meets Arch. Alessandra Montenero, authoritative voice of the design of the suburb of Rome in the 70s and 80s.