Scripta 2026: the art-in-words festival returns to Florence
Starting Tuesday, October 13, the sixteenth edition of Scripta. L’arte a parole (“art in words”) opens at Libreria Brac, the bookstore at Via de’ Vagellai 18 r in Florence. This year’s edition runs through March 13, 2027.
The chosen title is “Vista Mare” (“sea view”), an unusual phrase for a city like Florence, but “the hope is to look at the sea to nourish the imagination and to set our gaze free,” explains curator Pietro Gaglianò. “The program is one of aesthetic education, attentive to those who stand beyond our geographic, social and linguistic horizon. The Scripta project involves artists and scholars, inviting them to keep in mind the ‘sea view’ as a threshold, a departure, a landing place. Of primary importance, in this sea of many shores, is the involvement of audiences, students and young artists.” With these words Pietro Gaglianò describes his project, which aims to promote art and culture with particular attention to supporting artists, including those of the younger generations.
Nicholas Mirzoeff, To See in the Dark: Palestine and Visual Activism
The first Scripta event at Libreria Brac is on October 13 at 6:30 p.m., when Nicholas Mirzoeff, a professor at New York University, presents his book To See in the Dark: Palestine and Visual Activism since October 7, published in Italian this year by Meltemi. The author retraces the horrors of the tragedy in the Gaza Strip that began on October 7, 2023. He dwells on the full brutality of colonial violence, too often observed through the supremacist ‘white gaze’, which has turned the tragedy into an abstract, normalized vision. With the help of footage shot by Palestinians themselves, Mirzoeff, one of the leading scholars of visual culture, proposes to “see in the dark”: to dig through the rubble of so many lifeless bodies and erased images in order to rebuild a story no longer seen through the eyes of the executioner-victor. Only in this way is it possible to educate toward solidarity and resistance.
In November, Libreria Brac will host the artist Elena Bellantoni, a longtime sponsor and partner of the series. For a project in collaboration with the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze (Florence’s Academy of Fine Arts) and Brac, on November 14 at 6:30 p.m. the artist will present her work, inspired by the horizons of the sea and of resistance.
The Scripta Prize reaches its fifth edition
Another initiative promoted by Scripta. L’arte a parole is the fifth edition of the Premio Scripta per la giovane critica d’arte, a prize for young art critics run in collaboration with the publisher Gli Ori and open to scholars under 35. The idea is to develop an independent research project on contemporary art and social studies, to be written up as an essay. The call is open from October 19 to November 19, and the prize is a €2,000 grant plus publication of the essay in the series I limoni, out in 2027.
This year’s jury is made up of Olga Gambari, independent curator, art critic and journalist; Lorenza Pignatti, art critic and lecturer in Phenomenology of Contemporary Art at Naba; Annalisa Sacchi, full professor of Theater Aesthetics at Iuav; as well as Gli Ori publisher Paolo Gori and Pietro Gaglianò. The winner will be announced on December 3 at Libreria Brac.
Alongside the award ceremony, the same day will see the presentation of the book by Rokhaya Sofia Thiam, Black Matter. Di rappresentazioni della Blackness e altre materie oscure (on representations of Blackness and other dark matters), Gli Ori 2026, winner of the previous edition. The book reflects on the concept of blackness as “dark matter,” reading it as a substance in its own right that, though invisible, has managed to contaminate the entire visual field, from the arts to collective narratives.
On November 13 there will be a masterclass open to students, organized for the third year in collaboration with SRISA – Santa Reparata International School of Arts. The course, centered on critical writing through the analysis of themes, media and processes, will be led by Daniel Borselli and Pietro Gaglianò. Thanks to SRISA, emerging American artists will also take part.
Many artists have presented their publishing projects over the festival’s various editions.
On January 15 at 6:30 p.m. the program will feature the book by artist Cesare Viel, Si può tremare per una frase. Testi performativi 1990-2024 (one can tremble at a sentence: performative texts 1990-2024), published by Postmedia. The volume collects the texts Cesare Viel has written over thirty years of artistic practice: thirty texts, selected and arranged chronologically, conceived to be performed by the artist, alone or with other performers, in different ways: lecture, performance, video, audio pieces, environmental installations, relational devices.
In February Maria Giovanna Mancini will present her book Paesaggi integrati. Arte contemporanea come progetto del territorio (integrated landscapes: contemporary art as a project for the land; Gli Ori, 2025). The author’s research reflects on landscape as a “critical nexus,” crossed by the visions of artists, who become its “emotional, intellectual, relational guide.” The book thus weaves a web of connections between recent regulatory history, from the EU level down to the regional one, and the ability of artists and communities to develop, take in and relaunch forms of living together: “cultural practitioners in Italy have launched projects that not only find their privileged place in shared space but, moving beyond the city, find their landing places in the peri-urban and rural belts.”
This edition will once again involve two ARCI clubs in the city, part of Italy’s network of grassroots cultural and social clubs: the Circolo ARCI fra i Lavoratori di Porta al Prato and the Circolo “Vie Nuove”.
At Circolo Vie Nuove, artist Marco Mazzoni on the grammar of body and drawing
Over seven years of collaboration with Arci (and ten clubs involved), a dense network of works has taken shape: an alternative map of the contemporary that lives every day through interaction with the clubs’ communities, and that gives them back a central place in the cultural landscape from a cross-cutting perspective. Something that renews the extraordinary synthesis of social interaction in Tuscany.
At Circolo Vie Nuove in Florence, artist and performer Marco Mazzoni will develop, starting in December, a project on the grammar of the body and of drawing. Demis Rosa will coordinate the project, and the results will be presented at a closing public event on February 6. The occasion will also see the presentation of Teresa Macrì’s book Stato di incanto (state of enchantment), published by Postmedia, devoted to the intersections of dance, non-dance, post-dance and performance art, through the cross-pollination of disciplines that has gradually taken shape across the world of knowledge in recent decades.
At Circolo Arci di Porta al Prato in Florence, a participatory workshop
At Circolo Arci di Porta al Prato in Florence, artist and teacher Paolo Parisi, with Marta Fumanti and Antonio Vasquez, will run a workshop built on the history and the people of the club. The project, in collaboration with the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze, takes the form of a training course that will involve the Academy’s students in the first months of 2027. It will lead to a permanent installation and a series of actions to be presented at a public event on March 13.
The occasion will also see the presentation of the book by Maria Pia Guermandi, Restituire. L’elefante nella stanza dei musei occidentali (giving back: the elephant in the room of Western museums), Nomos edizioni 2026. The book reveals the power mechanisms that have shaped the Western idea of cultural heritage and of museum universalism: an invitation to radically rethink the future of museums and of global relations.
Finally, starting in January 2027, new episodes of the podcast Parlami di Lei. (“tell me about her”) will be available. The podcast gives voice to six figures from the worlds of art and culture, offering fresh takes on philosophical, aesthetic and political reflections on art.
More information: facebook.com/scriptafestival
