Cultural Heritage and “Freedom of Panorama”. Representing Italian Identity

What is the image of our country’s cultural heritage? Unfortunately it seemingly shows an image which is still fixed by taxonomic categories which, by forcedly separating cultural areas, products and actions, break up the unitarity that, even in local specificities, pervades our culture. In this regard, we should attempt to provide a fresh image, trying to regenerate it in the knowledge of that transformative process which, over time and in particular productive, socio-cultural and territorial contexts, has played a role in widening the very concept of cultural heritage. It is a question of adopting a change in perspective leading to actions addressed to shaping an image with which to enhance the parts and the whole, to form a cultural panorama that depicts places in their wide range of forms, expressions and productions. This can therefore provide the people with that sense of identity from which emerges the respect for cultural differences characterizing contemporaneity. The primary condition to depict this type of image may clearly be ascribed to the concept of freedom. Freedom to address different themes, genres, products, areas, events and so on, in a cataloguing mix that paints a picture where identity is also deduced from strong contrasts, from apparently incoherent light and shade. “Freedom of panorama” to be able to choose, represent and interpret following the standard norms, but irrespective of field restrictions and implemental prescriptions, even the highest expressions of cultural heritage. This paper intends to recommend some working hypotheses to paint the identity picture of some territorial areas by freely selecting, representing and interpreting the related tangible or intangible cultural heritage. A contemporary picture that also takes into account the multiculturality as central and unavoidable in describing cultural heritage as an open, living system.