Drone Fleet Paints 170-Square-Meter Mural in Turin

A fleet of drones created a 170-square-meter mural over two days in Turin, Italy, as part of the first public event of the UFO (Urban Flying Opera) project. The event took place on June 25 and 26 at Parco Aurelio Peccei, inside a large former industrial structure. The project, conceived by Carlo Ratti Associati and produced with support from Compagnia San Paolo and Fondazione Links, with technical collaboration from Tsuru Robotics, uses drones equipped with spray cans to paint murals based on crowdsourced images. Four UAVs applied eco-friendly paint in three colors—gray, magenta, and light blue—to create a collective artwork on the theme of urban transformation. The images were selected from thousands submitted via a dedicated website. A real-time software system tracked drone positions to control their movements. Carlo Ratti, professor at MIT and director of the Senseable City Lab, described the city as a blank canvas and said UFO accelerates citizen expression through drone technology. This is the first large-scale vertical drone painting experiment of its kind.