Abstract:

The main objective of the research project is to reconstruct the history, evolution and the way in which emerged the characters of the current high quality Italian production. Within this context the project will avoid approaches that are either celebrative or mainly descriptive of existing studies,  either linked to a stricly economic vision, that is not in measure to take into account the more complex cultural factors that are essential in determining the success of the little handicraft shops.
Even taking into account the diversity of the local regulatory frameworks and of the collection methods, Italy emerge the European country with the highest percentage of handicraft shops on the total of the industrial activities. In order to understand the characteristics of this kind of business, its strong roots within the local societies, and it typical territorial distribution within medium or long term specialised districts it is necessary to turn to the historical dimension. Quite often analysts link the performance and potentialities of the little handicraft business to their capacity to appear as the heirs of cultures, knowledge and productions that is attached to a tradition of excellence and quality that is deeply rooted in time and space.
The cultural heritage of handicraft business, however, is often seen as something static and objective, that can be passed on in the time and that has to be preserved in all its intangibility. This dimension exists without doubt, but in reality Italian handicraft businesses have never been the simple heirs of a pre-existing tradition. Already after the Italian unification, the quality and the tradition of handicraft productions were continuously revised, re-invented, and, above all, adapted to the market demand. By this way they tried to valorise the creative contents and the aesthetic values of the “arts and crafts”. Afterwards, during the 20th century, industry has more and more eroded even this territory of the traditional handicraft, as it succeeded in combining aesthetic values with the functionalities of the industrial production through the design and a direct relation with the artistic milieu.
Arts and crafts are nowadays only a small part of the new high quality handicraft. The reference to the artistic production has nowadays given way to a larger conception of the cultural heritage. In the common perception, the quality of the “Italian product” in the world is certainly linked to the heritage and to the myth of the “Bel Paese”, of the homeland of art and culture, but even in a larger sense to conceptions that include ways and styles of life, practices and tastes that – at the intersection between surroundings, landscapes and history – embed and reinvigorate the sedimentations of the past, including activities that once would have not been seen as “handicrafts”.
This project aims therefore to reconstruct from a historical point of view the dynamics through which the Italian handicraft  in the last two centuries innovated and adapted itself, permeating with its image and philosophy whole production contexts that have proved to be able to sustain and be successful in the international arena even during the current crisis.