The results of the six-week co-creation residency held in Basilicata as part of the second edition of the “Creative Communities” project in memory of David Sassoli are now available. The project was organized in collaboration with the Potenza Library Network, with support from Lo Stato dei Luoghi and the Lagonegrese Reading Pact, and under the patronage of the municipalities of Balvano, Filiano, Latronico, and Miglionico.

In its year as European Capital of Culture, Matera served as an example of how small-to-medium-sized cities located in marginal areas can promote and give rise to new models of highly participatory culture, demonstrating that constraints are often an opportunity to rethink and redesign the ways in which culture is produced and experienced.

During the residency, the team selected through a public call for proposals, composed of five professionals and two cultural enterprises from Basilicata, lived among the communities of Balvano, Filiano, Latronico, and Miglionico to identify needs and gather proposals regarding cultural infrastructure—that is, to co-design a model for a cultural hub that includes a library but offers a wide range of services.

To achieve this, a survey was conducted through meetings with schools, local administrations, and citizen groups, exploring the needs and services people expect to find in a library, with the aim of designing a model for the creation of local cultural centers that can serve a dual role as educational and community spaces while providing basic services. The goal is to promote, in contexts most characterized by economic and relational poverty, access to culture, social interaction, and education, creating opportunities for participation and social change, and offering community-based welfare services and visitor services.

The document produced as the outcome of the residency represents a toolkit, a sort of “toolbox” that can be made available to regional policymakers and individual local communities to define stable and replicable local policies.