Giovanna Bellini's AziMat-Map Pointer Illuminates Matera's Peripheries

Giovanna Bellini's light installation AziMat-Map Pointer, part of the Lumen/Socialight project curated by Agostino Riitano, transforms Matera's less central neighborhoods into a luminous map. Using geolocation as an aesthetic tool, the project includes fifteen light pointers marking five thematic itineraries of Matera 2019 and city entrances, plus over 3,000 Bag Lights—celestial blue circles—placed on buildings in the Sasso Caveoso district. The Bag Lights, created with students from Liceo Artistico Carlo Levi and local citizens, visualize pedestrian routes. Bellini describes the work as an object-oriented intervention, contrasting with her 2016 lighting of Giulio Romano's Pescherie for Mantua Capital of Italian Culture, which focused on urban regeneration. The project involved over 6,000 citizens in participatory design workshops by the Open Design School of Fondazione Matera 2019, engaging schools, associations, businesses, and the Madonna delle Grazie hospital. Bellini's mapping practice draws on the tradition of local luminarie used during the Festa della Bruna on July 2, redefining urban space through light.