modern light artificial materials
as opposed to
pre-modern massive natural materials,

terms in which only the contemporary value of the former is recognised.

The cities of stone are those Mediterranean cities that were directly generated by Greek and Roman civilizations, with their particular form of rationality, and the aesthetic values of which have become over time ideals shared by Western culture.
The architectonic characteristics of the Mediterranean city are nowadays subjected to a cultural aggression without precedent.
New aesthetic and cultural models, based on hedonism and elevation of the relative to that of the absolute, impose on and undermine the concept of their very identity.

On one hand the Cities of stone exhibition aims to investigate which are the dominant models that govern the urban and landscape transformation underway.
On the other it attempts to investigate whether there are alternative hypotheses to those based on the myth of modernist, hi-tech, deconstructed architecture, stripped of memory, uprooted from its tradition, when not absolutely ideologically opposed.

The Cities of stone exhibition, while taking all the necessary precautions within a thematic field as yet little researched, is aimed at posing the problem of the critical recognition of the current potential of a stone masonry culture, intended not only as continuity with traditional construction techniques but also as their radical renewal.

An exhibition that was born from the conviction that there still exist Mediterranean architectonic ideals and they are still vital, but risk being swept away.
Furthermore, a strong critical conscience is necessary to counteract the threat derived from the on-going processes of planetary cultural homologation.

The exhibition is divided into three sections:

1. Project South / International exhibition of design proposals for the South of Italy
This exhibition proposes a series of projects expressly chosen for Sensi contemporanei aimed at the restoration of the coastal landscape of Southern Italy, which has the demolition of unsightly buildings, present on the selected sites, as a prerequisite.

2. The Other Modernity / The Twentieth Century Mediterranean city
This section will illustrate themes, problems and works from the grand season of Mediterranean masonry architecture at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, which consisted of the modern design response of countries with a Latin tradition to the “white dream” of Nordic rationalism.

3. Stereotomic Architecture / Building with stone today
This section will present prototypes, both full size and scale models, of elements of stereotomic architecture, realized using cad/cam procedures, aimed to illustrate the potential of the application of load bearing stone in contemporary architectural design.

Throughout the period in which the exhibition is open, its contents will be accompanied by a series of events (debates, conferences, conventions, seminars and workshops) during which all those involved in the field covered by the Cities of stone exhibition will be called on to share their expertise.