Cohort: SOMET 39

Topic of the thesis: Circuits of Place Valorisation: Graffiti Writing and Street Art in Contemporary Creative Urban Strategies 

Abstract: The focus of the project rests on the inquiry of the ongoing opposed yet simultaneous circuits of value attribution affecting graffiti and post-graffiti, and their effects on and in the urban spaces and their management. Particular attention is given to the discursive repertoires and narratives, which function as measures of value, trying to engage a critique to the current elaborations of the "Creative City" framework by Landry (2000) and Florida (2002), with the theoretical lenses provided by the concepts of aesthetic (Böhme, 2010, 2017) and cognitive (Vercellone, 2005; Boutang, 2007) capitalism, which help capturing the role of art and creativity in the new expressions of capitalist economy. The reason for this investigation draws upon the key role assumed by creativity in the unfolding urban processes and the pivotal social and cultural significance held by graffiti and street art (Brighenti, 2016a). These practices give a particularly heuristic perspective on the processes of place valorization in the current transformations of capitalism (Pattaroni, 2020). The research will be conducted with a progressive focusing approach and built on a comparative instrumental case study. As required by the latter, the data collection will be based on several sources, in particular participant observation, in-depth interviews, and documentary and visual analysis.

Research interests: power relations in public space and struggle for its appropriation; urban decay; urban development strategies through creative practices; incorporation of informal practices; measure systems and mechanisms for value attribution

Graduated from: University of Trento, BA; University of Trento and Higher School of Economics, Saint Petersburg, Russia, MA.

Degrees obtained: International Relations and Political Sciences, BA; Sociology and Social Research (Trento)/Modern Social Analysis (Saint Petersburg), MA

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