Mauro Staccioli's 'Prato '88' sculpture destroyed after years of neglect

Mauro Staccioli's monumental sculpture 'Prato '88' (1988), a 34-meter-long, 12-meter-high iron and concrete inverted arch, was dismantled and left on a roadside for about ten years after the expansion of the Museo Pecci in Prato, designed by Maurice Nio, eliminated its original site. Despite plans to relocate it to a roundabout near the police station, approved in 2009 by then-public works assessor Enrico Giardi, the project stalled. In 2016, with a budget of €60,000, the municipality commissioned Nigro & C. Costruzioni to install it, but construction permits were never filed, halting work. Recently, it emerged that the roundabout site was reassigned for a pedestrian cycle path designed by Nio, funded by the Ministry of the Environment. Culture assessor Simone Mangani now proposes a technical-artistic commission to find a new location, possibly in a future urban park at the former hospital site. However, Staccioli had sent a letter to the Pecci museum forbidding use of the work without his approval. The artist died in 2018, leaving the sculpture's fate unresolved.