This, like the other themes chosen, has allowed Siracusa to be linked to the other cities of the Val di Noto during the designing of many itineraries. In fact many trails start at Siracusa with themes that lead to sites that are less famous and little visited.
Of the various evocative itineraries that have been designed, “Tower facades and Mother Churches of the Val di Noto” leads you round the architectural facades which characterise the area and make it unique, starting from Siracusa, Noto, Ragusa leading to smaller places like Floridia, Buccheri, Avola, Militello and so on, drawing attention to the corpus of baroque religious architecture that was rebuilt in the Val di Noto after the earthquake of 1693.
Other trails emphasise the naturalistic-archeological context, putting the cities that were re-founded after the destruction of 1693 in relationship with their original sites, now abandoned. Avola and Noto are two such examples which cannot be understood fully without considering the indissoluble links with the original old sites whose glorious past lies buried in the ruins.
This combination, still undiscovered by mainstream tourist tours, is the focal point of these itineraries of memory, and suggest a reading of urban history that can happen by following traces and fragments of them, piecing together a series of elements in order to trace relationships, dissonances and analogies between architectural forms, and giving form to the ‘bone-structure’ of the virtual museum of the Baroque of the Val di Noto. Through a newly created app, already at an advanced stage of experimentation, it’ll be possible to complete these trails of knowledge and promotion, with access to the sites, thus embracing the concept of open museums.
With the support of the Centro Internazionale di Studi sul Barocco, a prestigious institute for research and promotion of Sicilian baroque heritage that has for year been studying and developing thematic cultural itineraries around the baroque of the Val di Noto and with other Italian regions and around the Mediterranean, the aim is to give new life to the traditional museum by experimenting with new forms of ‘exhibition’ which will support the traditional forms; a network which will connect various sites on the basis of their identity.
The itineraries represent a possibility for developing sustainable tourism and an instrument for consolidating and promoting the rich, layered heritage which characterises the Val di Noto, using technological innovation to renew its image and its capacity to communicate.
Gennaio 2021