Contemporary Murals in the Street and Urban Art Field: Critical Reflections between Preventive Conservation and Restoration of Public Art

Abstract

This paper focuses on the presentation of some of the main critical reflections concerning the current debate about conservation and restoration of contemporary murals in the Street and Urban Art field. More and more, the operations thought of for this kind of wall paintings are connected to the concept of preventive conservation or some actions with the aim of reducing the future deterioration linked to the outdoor context. The idea of protecting urban and street murals arises from two principal issues: on one hand, the (not yet) official, but social, recognition of them as works of art and beloved icons in the communities—or better “testimonies which spread the values of civilization” (definition of Cultural Heritage) from the last decades of the XX century to nowadays—and, on the other hand, the necessity of finding a way to preserve their artistic messages in the ephemeral urban context. In fact, developing a correct plan for the conservation and restoration of these works of art located in the outdoor context needs to consider—more than ever—the strict relationship between their materials, their environment, and even their viewer. This fragile axiom is strictly linked to the law of the street, where all the decay processes are, often, unpredictable. At the moment, the ICR’s (The Istituto Centrale per il Restauro) research in this field is focused on a work in progress project to develop some trials and tests with innovative materials for their preservation and a common glossary to outline particular forms of damaging in murals often based on “plastic on a wall”. The final aim could be to define institutional guidelines for the preservation of urban and street contemporary mural paintings in a perspective of a “share for care” conservative program.

Research on the Application of Synthetic Polymer Materials in Contemporary Public Art

“…Through a systematic study, the discussion of public art materials in the English literature mainly focuses on the sociality of public art [ 21 , 22 ], and public [ 23 , 24 ], cultural [ 25 ] or narrative analysis of materials in specific cases [ 26 , 27 ]. Although some studies presented discussions from the perspective of engineering and materials science, some focused on ceramic materials [ 28 ], and some on the preservation and restoration of public art [ 29 , 30 ]. There was a paper discussing materials science research from an interdisciplinary perspective, but the theme of the discussion was art education [ 31 ].…”

Critical and Analytical Approaches in a Contemporary Mural Painting' Retouching Process: The Key Study of Murals by Antonio Carena

“…Generally talking, an open-air museum is constituted by three main factors: the outdoor context and the community that differently interact with the artwork which needs to be socially and legally recognised as artwork and, therefore, as part of Cultural Heritage and Cultural Landscape [7].…”

Protecting Street Art from Outdoor Environmental Threats: What Are the Challenges?

“…For this reason, Urban Art was decreasingly perceived as vandalism, and recently, it has been recognised as an established and growing form of art [4]. With their artworks, street artists still want to express their political, ethical, and social idea/issue, which is aimed at being handed down from the current population to the future one [5]. In this way, they contribute to the aesthetic and ethical enrichment of the urban space thanks to the extraordinary communicative power of Urban Art [6]; the citizens gained a new artistic awareness, beginning to appreciate the themes and the pictorial techniques, with the consequent renewal and improvement of popular-class blocks and more critical neighbourhoods.…”