The former baroque church of Santa Chiara will be revealed to the public in all its newfound beauty on Monday at 6pm. The reopening takes place after eight years and after a long and careful restoration work, which has just been completed. It was conducted, under the watchful eye of the Superintendence, by the Lithos company of Venice. The stuccos have found new light as has the frescoed dome. The exultation of the Baroque decoration reappears in all its fascinating opulence as seen by the people of Cuneo who entered it for the first time in 1738. The intervention cost 570 thousand euros, 80% financed by the Culture Fund of the Ministry of Culture and the remaining part with a surplus from the city administration, «involved all the frescoes on the walls, on the vault and on the dome. The cleaning of the frescoed parts was thorough, as was the glazing of all the decorated and stucco parts, as well as the pictorial reintegration of the most valuable wall surfaces.” The recovery of Santa Chiara also marks a beginning: the first form of partnership between public and private. The new life of the former church is entrusted for 25 years to the Il Melarancio cooperative which will take care of it together with the Municipality.
Gimmi Basilotta, president of the Melarancio cooperative which together with the Municipality will take care of the former church for 25 years (DANILO NINOTTO)
Cristina Clerico, Councilor for Culture, underlines the importance of the new tool: «We are experimenting for the first time and among the first in Italy with the sharing of an asset that becomes a cultural space, responding to a need deeply felt by the city. The Melarancio cooperative will make it usable not only for shows but for cultural production, involving other realities. In this way the intervention is not only aimed at conserving the beauty, but at enhancing it and sharing its care. It is the novelty of the Special Public-Private Partnership for which we had the consultancy of Fitzcarraldo and which will continue in other aspects with Hangar Piemonte”.
Gimmi Basilotta, president of Melarancio, will receive the keys to Santa Chiara on Monday at the inauguration. Basilotta looks at the space and already sees it as it will be in the future: full of creativity for everyone from children to the elderly to whom the «Age against the machine» project is dedicated to combat age discrimination. «We will install a stage that rises and lowers, to make the space usable both as a theater and for other activities and in the sacristy there are tables and a small food corner – he says -. It will be a financial commitment of one million euros, half of which we will receive thanks to a tender from the Region. It will be a great challenge.” At the ribbon cutting, Melarancio will tell the story of Santa Chiara and at 9.15pm it will present an environmental sustainability project.
