The curtain rose yesterday at Cittadellarte on the fourth edition of the CirculART 4.0 project, in partnership with the Material Innovation Lab (MIL) of the Kering group and in collaboration with 16 other companies of excellence. Until September, three selected artists and three fashion designers have the opportunity to collaborate with manufacturing companies to create works and clothes in a platform dedicated to research on the themes of circularity, transparency, traceability and responsibility of a ‘new’ textile supply chain. CirculART 4.0, developed in collaboration with UNIDEE Residency Programs and Fondazione Pistoletto’s curatorial team, is conceived and realised by Fashion B.E.S.T. – Better Ethical Sustainable Think-Tank, Cittadellarte’s sustainable fashion workshop founded by maestro Michelangelo Pistoletto and Franca Sozzani in 2009.

Inspiration
Following Michelangelo Pistoletto‘s vision of the Third Paradise, the artists and fashion designers selected for CirculART 4.0 collaborate with partner companies in the exploration of a new dynamic balance in harmony between nature and artifice. Since 2019, CirculART has been promoting art that effectively dialogues with sustainable fashion, ethics and innovation, addressing crucial issues such as climate change and contributing to the development of the UN SDGs culture.

I protagonisti
Il progetto coinvolge tre artisti e tre fashion designer internazionali selezionati attraverso un accurato processo di valutazione da parte dell’Advisory Board e del team curatoriale della Fondazione Pistoletto. Le artiste Camilla Alberti, Giulia Filippi, Mako Ishizuka, insieme ai fashion designer Francesca Basta di Made for a Woman, Piero D’Angelo e Martina Boero di Cavia, sono chiamati a realizzare le loro opere in dialogo con i materiali e il know-how delle aziende coinvolte come partner tecnici, con l’obiettivo di esplorare e valorizzare la collaborazione e la circolarità sostenibile all’interno della filiera produttiva dell’industria tessile, “a dimostrazione di come l’arte – si legge nell’apposita nota stampa – possa contribuire alla costruzione di un nuovo paradigma socio-ecologico a partire dalla filiera della moda attraverso la collaborazione e le sinergie produttive di artisti, designer e aziende. CirculART connette arte, moda e sostenibilità, riunisce diversi attori della filiera tessile impegnati in un’economia circolare, mettendo in luce aziende manifatturiere che hanno scelto un modello di business innovativo”.

The protagonists
The project involves three artists and three international fashion designers selected through an accurate evaluation process by the Advisory Board and the curatorial team of Fondazione Pistoletto. The artists Camilla Alberti, Giulia Filippi, Mako Ishizuka, together with the fashion designers Francesca Basta of Made for a Woman, Piero D’Angelo and Martina Boero of Cavia, are called upon to realise their works in dialogue with the materials and know-how of the companies involved as technical partners, with the aim of exploring and enhancing collaboration and sustainable circularity within the textile industry‘s production chain, ‘demonstrating how art,’ reads the press release, ‘can contribute to the construction of a new socio-ecological paradigm starting from the fashion supply chain through the collaboration and productive synergies of artists, designers and companies. CirculART connects art, fashion and sustainability, bringing together different players in the textile supply chain committed to a circular economy, highlighting manufacturing companies that have chosen an innovative business model‘.

The Advisory Board and Collaborations
This edition of CirculART has an Advisory Board that supports the selection of artists and fashion designers and directs the strategic choices for the international development of the project. The Advisory Board includes the following figures: Christian Tubito, Material Innovation Lab Director Kering; Maria
Fernanda Hernandez, Global Sustainability Expert and Sustainability Director Temera; Matteo Magnani, Senior Policy Analyst Ellen MacArthur Foundation; Cecilie Thorsmark, CEO Copenhagen Fashion Week; Sara Sozzani Maino, Creative Director Fondazione Sozzani; Michelle Francine Ngonmo, Founder and CEO Afro Fashion Association and Black Carpet Awards; Jalaj Hora, Founder and CEO of Synthegrate, former Global Vice President of Product Innovation and Consumer Creation Nike; Gabi Scardi, art historian, curator and director of the Public Art course at Accademia Unideee.

Collaborations
CirculART 4.0 benefits from the important collaboration with Temera, a Beontag Group company and exclusive partner for traceability and technological innovation. Temera, through its know-how and solutions, will lead the collection of data from the production chain of each artistic work in the project to create the backbone of their digital product passport (DPP). Through this digital document, each creation will be able to tell its story to the public in a transparent and exciting way. As for the manufacturing partners of CirculART 4.0, they are 16 companies of excellence operating in the field of innovative and sustainable fashion: Albini Group, Brunello, Erica Industria Tessile, Filatura Astro, Lanecardate, Lenzing Group, Maglificio Maggia, Madiva, Maeba International SB, Officina39, Piacenza Group, Pulvera, Successori Reda S.B.p.A., Regenesi, Tessuti di Sondrio, Zegna Baruffa Lane Borgosesia. Finally, the CirculART project has a scientific partner, Acqua Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to the protection and enhancement of water through three fundamental pillars, namely Art, Advocacy and Aid.

The docufilm
A docufilm will accompany the journey and narrate the most significant moments of the project from its launch, including visits to partner companies and the textile supply chain, the development and production of the design proposals and the inauguration of the works. The CirculART 4.0 project through the works of artists and fashion designers will be presented in September 2025, on the occasion of Milan Fashion Week, to be followed by other cultural and exhibition events.

The voice of the director of Cittadellarte
‘The central circle of the symbol of the Third Paradise,’ said Paolo Naldini, ’represents a space where different individuals and organisations come together to create new forms of living. Businesses and artists, designers and researchers, communication experts, climatologists and scientists together at work, the work of an art that assumes the greatest possible responsibility: that which comes from the greatest possible freedom. Both, freedom and responsibility, can no longer remain, as in much of the 20th century, personal or singular facts: today a chain of responsible creation unites in a circle, or rather: in three circles, the authors of this work.