The Canavese: a Museum of Plastic and the role of this material in society
While it is difficult to quantify the plastic objects for industrial or domestic use that exist and are used every day (take, for example, agri-food distribution, transport, hospitals, schools, offices, and homes), it is even harder to imagine a world without plastic.
Malleable, insulating, flexible, and durable, plastic is “[…] as essential to our way of life as the very air we breathe.” This is according to Jeremy Rifkin, an American economist, essayist, and environmentalist. We can, therefore, acknowledge that plastic is not inherently a bad material; we just need to learn how to manage it. It is no secret that the use of this versatile material is accompanied by the much debated question of its environmental impact. While the durability of plastic is an advantage, it is also the reason why the molecules that compose it can take hundreds of years to break down. Plastic pollution has irreversible harmful effects on the entire planet, with dangerous consequences for human health. Bad habits, illegal landfills, and the widespread mismanagement of industrial waste allow plastic to enter natural ecosystems and the food chain. However, research and innovation in the field of ecology today offer some solutions for managing plastic materials. Once the sale of disposable items has been banned, recycling remains the key activity on which to focus: waste becomes a resource to create something new.
In this sense, it is important to spread values and practices that make everyone aware, involved, and responsible. The Cannon-Sandretto ‘Civiltà della Plastica’ Museum of Plastics in Pont Canavese offers various points for reflection through a detailed account of the history of plastics, as well as panels and installations that highlight the environmental risks associated with use of plastic.
The Cannon-Sandretto ‘Civiltà della Plastica’ Museum of Plastics
Telling the story of plastic through the objects that have made its history. With this idea in mind, Gilberto Sandretto has collected and arranged hundreds of items since 1995 in a museum that describes over a century of technological and commercial evolution of plastic. He chose the rooms of Sandretto Industrie’s Liberty style headquarters – a company founded by his family after the war. The Cannon Group, operating in the sector of technologies for plastics and the environment, took over the museum complex, restored it, and integrated the collection by reorganising the exhibition and the visitor itinerary, before reopening it to the public in 2016.
Plastic is also part of the history and tradition of our country. For example, during the years of the economic boom, isotactic polypropylene invented by Giulio Natta, Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1963, appeared in the homes of Italians. Known by the name of Moplen, this new product quickly filled homes worldwide with household items, suitcases, toys, buckets, tubs, and colourful containers. The generation whose “bedtime was after Carosello” will remember Gino Bramieri and his endless refrains advertising the prodigious functionality of an “unmistakable, light, resistant” plastic.
At the Museum of Plastics, the substance that “God had forgotten to create” is rediscovered in its different forms, uses, and origins. The collection boasts thousands of objects, providing a large repertoire for the programming of temporary exhibitions: from household appliances to hygiene products, from toys to furniture. Surrounding the museum is a lush park at the entrance to the Orco Valley, at the foot of the Gran Paradiso, the oldest Italian National Park.
The Canavese Region combining spirit and senses
An important industrial context is a key feature of the Canavese region. In addition to the historic Olivetti company, which is still based in Ivrea, metallurgical, steel, chemical, and textile factories operate in this area. But the steep vineyards and the domesticated nature of these places also satisfy art and history enthusiasts.
The Sacro Monte di Belmonte, for example, dominates the Alto Canavese, just beyond the medieval towers of Cuorgné. The structure is typical of the nine sacred mountains of Lombardy and Piedmont that, since 2003, have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site: a gentle climb – bordered by thirteen circular chapels and dense vegetation – leads to the central body of the complex. In Belmonte, the Via Crucis and the Passion of Christ are glorified: devotees who could not go to the Holy Land viewed the ascent to the Sanctuary as a journey of faith.
The events linked to the Castle of Aglié, which stands out on the horizon just beyond the Orco stream, are by no means as sacred or spiritual. A Touring Club of Italy Orange Flag holder, this town was chosen as the home to one of the House of Savoy’s secondary residences. In the centuries of peak Savoy splendour, a lavish series of palaces and castles served as a “Crown of Delights” to the Capital of the Kingdom, welcoming various members of the local aristocracy for hunting days and courtly pleasures. Today, the Castle of Aglié impresses with its size and grandeur, but also with the quality of the art preserved here. Furthermore, Guido Gozzano, a crepuscular poet who often returned to his “beloved Canavese plains”, evoking the memories of a provincial youth never forgotten, was originally from Aglié.
