AAVV, VUOTO 2 / CONTROVERSO, 2020

The events related to the global spread of the COVID-19 virus in the first half of 2020 caused, among other things, a sudden and explosive spread of the practices of temporary / adaptive / reactive intervention on the city. Mostly unknown until a few months ago, even among project professionals, expressions such as “temporary public spaces”, “pop-up cycle paths” and “tactical urbanism” have become common on the news and in bars. They are public topics of conversation and debate. Supporters and opponents analyse projects and envision future developments. In the meantime, many administrations have launched into real experiments and those that had already faced these issues, such as Barcelona, ​​Milan or Paris, have drastically accelerated their work. This sudden acceleration cannot exclude to ask questions. We are witnessing a turning point in the way of thinking about transformation processes, one wonders, or is it just a moment of transition? Is it a new way of making the city consolidating itself in this dialectic? Are traditional spatial planning and its static nature still sustainable models? After the experience of COVID 19 and the consequent adaptive plans, it is clear that the contemporary city must develop tools and programs to respond quickly to sudden events. Could this constant relationship with the unexpected be the future of urban planning? Can the city be built by many small gestures, even unexpected ones? Can these gestures really open the possibility to enormous transformations? VUOTO 2 / CONTROVERSO collects contributions from architects, artists, researchers with the aim of opening a debate on these issues. A dialogue that will always be in constant evolution, as is the construction of the city itself.