Panorama Pozzuoli - a project by Italics

For the fifth edition of Panorama, the city-wide exhibition conceived by ITALICS – returns to its roots, to the beating heart of Campania: Pozzuoli

From 10 to 14 September 2025, the eagerly awaited appointment will take place amidst the volcanic and mythological scenarios of Pozzuoli, a city-threshold between land and sea, history and imagination. Dominating it, the Rione Terra, a promontory and fulcrum of the city’s identity, beneath which lies one of the Mediterranean’s most evocative archaeological routes. An area that has been uninhabited since the Seventies and is now made accessible and visitable again thanks to an ambitious restoration project. Curating this fifth edition is Chiara Parisi, director of the Centre Pompidou-Metz, who will take the public on an immersive journey between divinity and creation, in a dialogue between memory and the urgencies of the present. 

The fil rouge of Panorama Pozzuoli is the theme of deification, a concept that spans ages and sensibilities and that encounters a profoundly natural resonance in Pozzuoli. Here, where myth is intertwined with history and nature manifests itself in spectacular and powerful forms, the divine inhabits every stone, every view, every ancient ruin. From the cults of the past to the tales of heroes and demigods that populate local traditions, up to the most contemporary interpretations of transcendence, Pozzuoli offers an ideal setting to explore how art can intertwine – and interrogate – memory, the archetype, the absolute. A place where the spiritual dimension becomes a visual, urban and collective experience. 

“In Pozzuoli one can talk to the gods. Deification is not just a theme, – curator Chiara Parisi explains – it is a question that runs through the entire history of this territory: what happens when humanity is measured against the sacred, against power, against death? Starting from the figure of the deified emperor up to popular apparitions, the theme runs through both ancient history and contemporary imagination. And today, in the age of image worship, who do we deify? And why?” 

Caterina Tognon will be presenting an immersive installation with glass, lights and music by Maria Grazia Rosin.