"Roots, not spotlights: the real challenge of Agrigento as Capital of Culture"
Already twenty years before Goethe 's arrival, Agrigento had enchanted Baron Von Riedesel who, in 1767, while a guest at the Augustinian convent, wrote: " This is paradise, I would like to live here ." Today, with the high-sounding title of Italian Capital of Culture 2025 , the city continues to be talked about, but for very different reasons.
Giovanni Taglialavoro spoke to us about it on Saturday, August 1st, during the awards ceremony of the 17th photography competition organized by Agrigento Oggi . In the cloister of the Town Hall, Taglialavoro received the " Sicilian Pride Beyond Borders " award. A journalist from another era, trained at Teleacras, he is an established television writer and a key figure in Italian journalism.
During the evening, a debate was held with Domenico Vecchio , editor of Agrigento Oggi, during which Taglialavoro forcefully denounced a glaring contradiction: "We are sitting on an extraordinary oil well. The list of cultural resources we have," he explained, "is long: Pirandello, Sciascia, the Valley of the Temples, a thousand-year history, a language, breathtaking beauty ."
Yet, he emphasizes, "no room has been given to our local excellence . Culture has been imported as a prepackaged product, hosted rather than constructed, with little or no trace of Sicilianness, lacking that authentic and profound expression that should have been the beating heart of a true Capital of Culture."
In one of the significant passages of his speech, the journalist recalled the figure of the Jesuit architect Angelo Italia , called in 1693 to rebuild Noto after the devastating earthquake. The first thing he decided to design was the church, not because houses or roads weren't needed, but because from there, from a symbolic and shared place, collective identity is born. And without identity, nothing can be rebuilt—not a city, much less a community.
An identity that has slipped from the grasp of those who should have protected it, enhanced it, turned it into a strength and not just a slogan. Today, it seems all it takes is setting up a stage, organizing a well-crafted event, turning on the lights, and taking a few photos to convince yourself you've created culture. But once the curtain closes, little or nothing remains. No trace, no legacy.
This is why – insisted Taglialavoro – we don't need yet another ephemeral exhibition, but a permanent laboratory , a place where culture is not just a spectacle to be consumed, but an exercise in thought.
Taglialavoro concluded his speech with a simple yet revolutionary idea: " It's not about winning a title, but about building a future . Only when we are able to graft events onto an authentic, living cultural foundation shared by the local community, only then," he stated, " will we truly be able to say we've won ."
And while talking with Domenico Vecchio, the reference to the travellers of the Grand Tour who arrived here by carriage, visited the places, took notes and then wrote that Agrigento was a place of the soul comes naturally.
Today Agrigento does not ask for celebrations, but for recognition and centrality, to return to imagining a future with deep roots
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