Luca Vitone's Memorial Grove Opens Under Genoa's New Bridge

On August 14, 2020, Luca Vitone inaugurated 'La Radura della Memoria' (The Clearing of Memory), a memorial grove planted beneath the new Ponte Genova San Giorgio in Genoa, designed by Renzo Piano. The grove honors the 43 victims of the Morandi bridge collapse that occurred on August 14, 2018. The project is part of the larger Parco del Ponte regeneration scheme led by Stefano Boeri Architetti, Metrogramma Milano, and Inside Outside | Petra Blaisse. Vitone's work, presented by Galleria Pinksummer of Genoa, features a diverse selection of trees including chestnut, strawberry tree, hazel, ash, olive, walnut, cherry, lime, apple, beech, apricot, and bitter orange, chosen by agronomist Laura Gatti to ensure biodiversity. Vitone describes the grove as 'an amphitheater where time is forged by nature to protect memory and biodiversity,' emphasizing its role as a political act against ecological crisis and a return to ancestral harmony. The artist has long explored the relationship between humans and plants, as seen in his 2009 work 'Vuole Canti' at the Civica Galleria in Trento, where he photographed 18 trees personifying fellow artists.