Neglected Spaces of Exposure: Walls and Abandoned Buildings as Artistic Instances of Territorial Formation

This chapter examines walls and abandoned industrial buildings as key sites of visual exposure and territorial formation in post-industrial cities. Drawing on multiple researches conducted in Milan and Turin since 2008, it explores how urban muralism and artistic interventions operate as socio-symbolic devices capable of re-signifying neglected spaces and reconfiguring their political and cultural meanings. Moving beyond an object-based understanding of public art, the chapter conceptualizes walls as practices and relational infrastructures through which memory,identity, and collective agency are negotiated. By situating contemporary muralism at the intersection of urban regeneration, visual politics, and participatory cultural production, the contribution sheds light on the ambivalent role of art in post-industrial urban transformations, oscillating between grassroots spatial claims and institutionalized strategies of urban branding