MicroRuins. The role of debris in post-seismic reconstruction and the Italian restoration culture

What happens if the loss of a building’s integrity corresponds to its sudden reduction to debris? Can this hyper-fragmented materiality regain either historical value, figurative configuration or somehow significance in terms of psychological compensation? Can debris be reconsidered as a means to reconfigure the building, and ‘raise emotions’? The Italian restoration culture, starting from Cesare Brandi’s theory, has developed a specific attitude towards the re-composition of fragments in view of the reinstatement of the figurative unity of the work of art. Strongly rooted in Mediterranean civilizations, which cope with the physical remnants of past constructions since ever, the idea of recovering whatever material remnant of a building construction - from spolia to artistic fragments - has slowly become tradition taking shape during the last century, until the last decade in occurrence of the recent seismic episodes in Central Italy (2009, 2012, 2016). Debris produced by the dramatic ruin of buildings, mainly urban fabric of ancient villages rather than monuments, represents the last resort to imagine post-seismic reconstruction, as means to reconfigure not only houses, but the cultural identity of people and places in the post-trauma scenario. This contribution will attempt to briefly retrace the development of the ‘special’ approach to ruins and fragments in the Latin world, finetuned by the historical and the artistic perspective, recalling the major experiences that have flanked the theoretical reflection, until the latest experiments developed in occasion of post-seismic emergencies around the role of debris produced by the collapse of houses.