Date : Sep 26, 2025

Time : 14:45 - 16:45 PM

Abstract
The territory is a social artifact constructed through the relationships between land and the community that inhabits it. Contemporary challenges compel us to reflect on key territorial practices that can serve as guiding principles for change and for building new forms of collaboration, fostering social, environmental, economic, and cultural sustainability. In this context, culture can be regarded as the fourth dimension of sustainability, essential for the development of a collective consciousness capable of forging networks of solidaristic, responsible, multidisciplinary, and innovative relationships. These networks, as interpreters of the values and heritage of territories, have the potential to (re)generate ecosystemic communities that lead to new imaginaries and forms of culture.

Art, in all its expressions and as an integral part of culture, can serve as an extraordinary instrument for reflection and the implementation of critical thinking, thereby promoting change. Through its creative and design processes, art can strengthen social cohesion and activate new sustainable communities by building resilient relationships with the territories they inhabit.

Building on this perspective, the working group aims to explore the development of sustainable collaborative systems involving institutions, businesses, public entities, communities, researchers, artists, and professionals, with culture serving as the guiding thread. An interdisciplinary reflection is proposed to examine how to construct networks capable of fostering innovation, questioning organizational, governance, and co-design models, while also identifying the role of cultural institutions and their sustainability within these processes.

Main questions for discussion

1. What role do cultural institutions play in enabling territorial collaborations that foster sustainable social, environmental, economic, and cultural development?
2. What are the principal barriers currently hindering the formation, development, and functioning of collaborative communities?
3. What are the advantages of a local approach stimulated by a global vision for building culturally rooted projects in territorial contexts?