MAR – Miniera Argentiera
Mar – Miniera Argentiera is one of the three winning projects selected by Fondazione Italia Patria della Bellezza for the economic prize. In 2011, LandWorks was founded, a Sardinian association which aims to develop projects of experimentation and artistic production in abandoned sites. Landworks chose Argentiera as its base of operations, a former mining village now partly abandoned, an immense open-air experimental field.
Located on the west coast of Sardinia, Argentiera is included within the scope of the Historical and Environmental Geominerary Park of Sardinia of the Municipality of Sassari. Founded in 1867 as a mining town, today it represents one of the greatest examples of industrial archaeology. Following the mine’s closure in 1963, it is severely tested by the economic crisis, school dropout rates and depopulation: it currently has 54 inhabitants.
Mar Miniera Argentiera is an innovative participatory project that aims to revitalize the village through the enhancement of its tangible and intangible heritage. Characterized by geographical and social marginality, Mar aims to promote the urban, social and environmental redevelopment of the old industrial complex. The Municipality of Sassari and Landworks have restored the main historical artifacts and initiated an innovative process, involving numerous local and international bodies and institutions.
The main challenge is to make the town a center of multidisciplinary artistic experimentation and production of international excellence, and to realize a liquid museum in continuous development, bringing into dialogue closed and open spaces and transforming them into places not only dedicated to culture and learning, but also into places of relationship and sharing, sociability and confrontation. With its actions it safeguards the vocation, identity and memory of the mining site as a place of work, innovation and production: right here, where people labored in the mines, today culture is created and produced.