Festival and tradition in contemporary Florence
- Submitting institution
-
Birmingham City University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 32Z_OP_D1009
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1386/jucs.3.2.239_1
- Title of journal
- Journal of Urban Cultural Studies
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 239
- Volume
- 3
- Issue
- 2
- ISSN
- 2050-9790
- Open access status
- Compliant
- Month of publication
- June
- Year of publication
- 2016
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
-
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- This article challenges the argument, made by certain sectors of the heritage and tourist industry, which propose cities such as Florence, with art-historical significance, should be re-categorized as ‘museum cities’, since visitors, intent on acquiring particular ‘consumer’ experiences, outnumber the local population. Using the Feast Day of San Giovanni in Florence, Italy, as a case-study, this article evaluates the form of the festival’s events and their relationship to the urban landscape, in order to reveal some of the historical conditions that have shaped the city. It argues that these conditions, understood as civic praxis, are accessible to everyone—to different degrees—and suggest that Florence is anything but a museum.
This research reveals layers of meaning within the cultural history of Florence. The work included archival investigations, mapping the festival routes—both historical and present—using contemporary archaeological and geographical information, combined with first hand observations—photographs, recordings and sketches—of the current festival. This raw material was used to reveal the relevant topics which best communicated the continuity of festival praxis in Florence, both in the past and in the present. This approach has led to an understanding of the festival as a present-day event which has historical and architectural significance. The research makes a unique contribution to knowledge by adding a contemporary reading of the Festival of San Giovanni to the existing literature which is taken exclusively from a historical perspective.
Ultimately, this article demonstrates that the architecture of the city is not, as suggested by Eade and Sallnow (2013), a neutral space where action occurs with all values supplied by protagonists or worshippers, nor a museum. Rather, urban architecture is a critical part of the event itself that contributes to the authenticity of the occasion.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -