VIRTUAL Barcelona
Abstract
Bregaglia is a peripheral valley in southern Switzerland, located in the canton of Grisons. The area is recognized as the birthplace of the famous Giacometti art dynasty and in terms of its cultural heritage, it is regarded as the “valley of art”. The cultural heritage, irrevocably linked to this wild-romantic area close to the Italian boarder, has strong roots within the arts but at the same time, the heritage is mainly practiced through a historical and not a contemporary, let alone visionary lens. The Centre for Cognitive Art (CCA) by Swiss artist Felix Stoffel wants to change this. The CCA is based at the well-known Palazzo Salis in a village called Soglio, a Swiss Historic Hotel admired for its remarkable architecture, its focus on local product usage as well as the baroque garden. Said innovative hot spot for art lovers, art makers and art dealers alike in Bregaglia valley intends at re-creating a “renaissance of fine art”, contextualising its name by emphasising cognitive concepts which aim at analysing nature’s rhythms and vibrations. A newly established kind of image of the world (quite literally), is called fractal perspective. The latter encodes digital information products and makes them palpable for human senses (especially interesting in our age of information overflow as well as AI). The overarching aim of the CCA is to foster emerging artists, who incorporate said philosophy in their own artistic expressions in order to not only redefine the valley’s cultural heritage but also to contribute to the regional development efforts. The latter is vital for this peripheral area, as the locals are highly dependent on tourism and especially the dead season is a threat yet to be overcome. The here presented project CCA showcases a visionary concept adaptable for similar regions and is therefore highly relevant for community builders, regional developers or tourism experts.
Onna Rageth (*1991) was born and raised in Grisons, Switzerland. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Anthropology from University of Zurich and a Master of Arts in Creative Events Management from Falmouth University, UK. Onna is secretary of the Leisure Studies Association, UK. Currently, she works as a senior research associate as well as head of Living Lab Bregaglia at the Institute of Tourism and Leisure (ITF) at the University of Applied Sciences of the Grisons in Switzerland. Her fields of interests are community building in peripheral regions, cultural tourism and event studies.