Green Point- Orto Aperto

Permaculture system design initiatives *clicca qui per la versione in italiano*

Promoting horticultural activity in the city in order to guarantee the conservation of the environments in which we live, through regenerative and biodynamic agriculture techniques.

Spending our free time in the open air, learning how to produce bio fertilizers, seedlings and have healthy food.

Sustainability: an empty word or too rich in meaning? “[…] It is becoming more and more evident that the crucial problems of our time- energy, environment, climate change, food security, financial security - cannot be studied and understood separately, as they are systemic problems, that is, they are all interconnected and interdependent "(Fritjof Capra and Hazel Henderson, Qualitative Growth. For an ecologically sustainable and socially equitable economy, Aboca, 2009) Sustainability therefore concerns many aspects of the life of the world population; just think that the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, signed in 2015 by 193 UN member countries, includes 17 objectives for a total of 169 milestones (https://www.unric.org/it/agenda-2030) to be achieved by 2030.
This word - sustainability - so rich in references, should not scare us, on the contrary, it should make us feel involved since it concerns us all and we must do something to restore its full meaning: and this is possible first of all by inquiring to become aware, and then experimenting and applying good practices, sharing experiences and educating. Furthermore, as Capra and Henderson remind us "Evolution is no longer conceived as a competitive struggle for existence, but rather as a collective choreography in which the driving forces are creativity and the constant introduction of innovation".
Where to start?

Vegetable gardens, gardens and balconies offer us an excellent opportunity to play our part in the change. Cultivating is a cultural act, and cultivating a vegetable garden or a garden is the highest expression of the agronomic culture developed by man. (translated from Clauser / Battiata).

Gardening and sustainability at the community garden of the Siena Art Institute: Our ongoing horticultural initiatives aim to inform citizens and visitors on the importance of becoming aware of environmental issues and, at the same time, offer the opportunity to participate in the project or to train to put into practice immediately, in your own garden or balcony, what we are exploring together.

TOGETHER WE ARE CREATING A MORE SUSTAINABLE DISTRICT. COLLABORATE WITH US!
Would you like to participate? Contact us at office@sienaart.org!

Related projects:

What is Permaculture?
Permaculture offers an approach to land management that integrates the presence of plants and animals in urban contexts. Exactly what can be used in Siena to revive its green spaces in a sustainable way.

Permaculture was born as a land design system that harmoniously integrates man with the environment and its elements (housing, food, natural resources, human and social relations). The goal is to design long-lasting settlements, as similar as possible to natural ecosystems, through the recognition, use and harmonization of landscape components (morphology, climate, soil, water, vegetation, animals) by developing relationships of mutual support between elements of the environment and people's needs and based on a "non-predatory" and "non-parasitic" lifestyle. The result is a system of great aesthetic, productive, and sustainable over time, with low maintenance costs.

(translated from the Italian Academy of Permaculture, www.permacultura.it.)

Permaculture training is part of the activities that the Siena Art Institute and the Siena School for Liberal Arts have been promoting for years to spread cultures and practices related to environmental sustainability for its students and for the city.

Bernardo Giorgi, coordinator of the garden

Art becomes an instrument of investigation and has man and his relationship with the environment as its main objectives. Bernardo has worked since the late nineties as an artist, searching for the identity of the territory through art, intervening with non-invasive works, in harmony with the host environment. The concept of nature, of place, is fundamental in his work. It is a journey through the territories of art in a continuous questioning of limits and boundaries, his is a wide-ranging research, a reconstruction of polyphonic identities that never stand still. In particular on the frontier territories through photographic works, videos, interviews, internet sites; in 1999 he was along the Polish-German border line, from Zittau to the North Sea, for the Borders Project, a path that gave rise to an intense exchange of different cultures and artistic experiments. In 2000 he works on the intercantonal linguistic frontiers in Switzerland. In 2002 he Between Dresden & Prague. Then up to Mongolia on the Trans-Siberian in China.

In the last few years, thanks to the "Patterns" project (Patterns Istanbul - from the map to the dress ", Arts and Crafts Office of the Istanbul Municipality ISMEK) and the Siena Permaculture group, I have deepened activities with participatory methods, in the context of sustainability, agriculture, territorial animation, awareness raising and dissemination of knowledge on environmental and social issues, public art (reflection and social transformation through art or creative methods: from cartography to clothing / living) .

As a (professional) artist he has worked in galleries and museums internationally. As a farmer he makes bread and carries out agricultural activities for self-consumption

He collaborates as an Instructor in the Art and Society course at the Siena Art Institute / Il Punto.

Bernardo Giorgi was born in Camerino in 1967, he lived for many years in Berlin. He currently lives and works in Siena.

Green Point- Orto Aperto

Sart life