Parafiction in un quartiere di Matera. Su un possibile contributo dell'arte contemporanea come metodo d'analisi della città

Abstract

Can Parafiction be used as a urban and public space investigation methodology?
Considering spread art's interest in actual urban and public space issues and looking at growing consideration of many academic fields towards art methodologies as a research tool, this paper will try to find out if contemporary, social and politically engaged art genre Parafiction could be used as analytic methodology for public space and urban field.
Applying Lambert-Beatty's Parafiction definition on a case study in Matera, research will attempt to describe strength and weak points of using Parafiction as a knowledge method for space analysis and participatory processes.
Outcome will show good possibilities to apply this art genre as a shifting knowledge tool, but too few case studies are still evaluable in order to consider Parafiction a proved methodology. Nevertheless Parafiction potentialities confirm a usefulness of art in qualitative urban studies.