Cultural Creativity and Local Development: The Experience of the Socio-Cultural District of Selinunte

Abstract

The pivotal idea of the Socio-Cultural District of Selinunte was inspired by a concept we found as a gift in that inexhaustible source of ideas that Borges’ texts (1995) still are. It might seem absurd to think of the biography of Michelangelo without any of his works… Yet, if we carefully think about it, we will realise that the endless series of acts composing the mosaic of a whole life is wide enough to allow us connecting a limited number of events among them. In addition, if we put those events in a diachronic sequence, they will take on the characteristics of a biography! That is Borges, up to here. If we select a different subject though, a territory for example, a consistent physiognomy could emerge in this case too, even if we leave aside the Temple ‘C’ of Selinunte or even the whole monument area of one of the largest and most complex archaeological parks in the Mediterranean area. We live in an era of cultures and territories, with emerging subjects who want to gain the place and role in history that have been long denied to them. This is also an era of decline of absolute values and grand theories. All that given, regaining (rebuilding or even making up) one’s identity is an inescapable strategic shift. Who will be in charge with the task of outlining the borders and contents of a community space? Who will be held responsible for drawing a face that is marked by the passing of time and made lively by our fresh contemporary energies? How can we avoid heritage becoming a burden rather than a challenge to think about the future?