Alberto Garutti's 'Ai nati oggi' Makes Rome's Piazza del Popolo Lampposts Pulse with Every New Birth

Starting July 2, 2019, the lampposts in Rome's Piazza del Popolo pulse with increased light each time a baby is born at the Policlinico Agostino Gemelli hospital, which sees over 4,000 births annually (more than 11 per day). The public art project, titled 'Ai nati oggi' (To Those Born Today), is by Italian artist Alberto Garutti and promoted by the Fondazione MAXXI and the Comune di Roma, curated by Hou Hanru and Monia Trombetta, in collaboration with the Fondazione Policlinico Universitario Agostino Gemelli. A button pressed in the hospital's maternity ward triggers the light intensification. Two explanatory metal plates near pedestrian entrances help viewers understand the mechanism. The work has previously celebrated births in Gent, Istanbul, Plovdiv, Moscow, Puglia, and Bergamo, where it originated in 1998. Garutti describes the project as building a different map of the city, an 'urbanistica narrativa' (narrative urbanism), as noted by Hans Ulrich Obrist in a 2007 Domus article. Obrist and Garutti see it as a continuation of the great art historical theme of the Nativity, realized through light. Giovanna Melandri, President of MAXXI, frames the work as a response to 'times of fear, indifference, and violence,' transforming Rome and all locations of this ongoing project into a global city of children, without distinctions or discrimination.