The art market, heritage and sustainable local development: Researching Art Markets past & present: Tools for the future (RAM-T).

The University of Bologna will host the international workshop “The art market, heritage and sustainable local development” on 102 July 2025, the tenth in the International Workshops Series Researching Art Markets past & present: Tools for the future (RAM-T). The Series is part of RAM-T, the international interdisciplinary initiative and community which was jointly founded by Elisabetta Lazzaro (Business School for the Creative Industries - University of the Creative Arts, UK), Nathalie Moureau (University Paul Valéry, Montpellier 3) and Adriana Turpin (IESA Art & Culture, Paris and the Society for the History of Collecting, London) in 2017.

Through individual presentations followed by group discussions, the RAM-T workshop series aims to bring together international scholars and professionals from different disciplines, periods of study and professional approaches to confront key issues and develop methodologies to analyse and interpret the structures, practices and principles of the art market, both historical and contemporary. Inaugurated in June 2018, workshops have taken place in Montpellier, Utrecht, London, Rome, Ljubljana, Paris, Rotterdam, Baton Rouge and Glasgow, and have covered topics spanning art collectors, the artist as an entrepreneur, the formation and development of new markets, communication strategies, legislation and finance, gatekeepers, markets for applied arts, artistic crafts and design, and art events.

The art market, heritage and sustainable local development

Artworks and art collections are part of cultural heritage, and are often displayed and traded in buildings, historical areas and other immovable settings that are also part of cultural heritage. Moreover, artworks and art objects may represent tangible elements connected with intangible heritage, such as rituals and traditions. This workshop will explore how the art market can contribute to an inclusive and sustainable valorisation of cultural heritage for local development, minimising the associated socio-economic costs. This perspective is particularly important within a “post-covid scenario” in which recovery and resilience can well pass through these specific channels. It is relevant also to the historical study of art markets, where the infrastructure of local economies and issues of internationalisation, such as transport and communication, influenced the art market.
Cultural heritage can generate socio-economic growth, for instance through (cultural) tourism, which has long been considered as the main traditional channel through which cultural heritage can be translated into local economic development. However, how can this mechanism be made more efficient and sustainable from a socio-economic perspective? And, in particular, how can the art market enhance local cultural heritage to favour a model of sustainable local development, the revitalisation of more remote areas, or the establishment of alternative hubs? We can refer for instance to the attempts favouring the development of local or minor art markets, as opposed to overcrowded art markets and agglomeration effects in major cities. On the other hand, how the global art market, and implied transportation, can be more sustainable?
Although cultural heritage has gained substantial institutional and academic attention as a contributor to local economic development, the empirical evidence on this topic is still scant. The impact of cultural heritage on the tourism industry has represented a rather traditional way to address development, but the subsequent link with local development needs some additional and deeper reflections. As such, potential drawbacks of (excessive) touristic flows have been highlighted from many perspectives, but they have been mainly focused on social and environmental concerns, basically disregarding the related potentially negative economic effects, that could be there, too. Furthermore, it is important to consider also some intangible and more sophisticated mechanisms through which cultural heritage can be enhanced, to favour a sustainable local socio-economic development. These are mainly related to territorial context conditions and up to now have been almost neglected within the existing studies. The workshop aims at addressing these issues.

We invite papers that explore forms, functions and impacts of the art market on the development of cultural heritage and it is sustainability from historical or contemporary perspectives. We aim for papers that significantly contribute and apply theoretical and empirical methodologies from different disciplines.

Possible areas of discussion include, but are not limited to:
• Structures and institutional models of local art markets
• Features of local art markets in terms of artistic production or objects being traded, and involved players (dealers, collectors, managers, curators, audience, etc.)
• Locational, as well as duration and recurrence strategies of local art markets, as opposed to the global art market
• Impacts of fairs, auctions, or biennials planning on year-round market activity
• Relationships between market-focused events (e.g., fairs and auctions) and those that are not explicitly commercial (e.g., biennials, artists' retrospectives)
• Possible role of new technologies in supporting sustainable local art markets
• Regional economic impact of cultural tourism on the art market, and socio-economic sustainability in the territorial context
• The role of intangible cultural heritage conditions in the relationship between material cultural heritage and local economic development
• How the art market can foster local hubs and creative collaborations from an entertainment and hospitality perspective
• Policies and organisational cultural strategies that support the development of local art markets and contribute to a sustainable socio-economic local development

Proposals submission and deadlines
We welcome submissions of rigorous theoretical or empirical (quantitative and/or qualitative) studies contributing to the topic illustrated above. We particularly welcome contributions that reflect on, or employ, innovative methodological approaches to these areas, and inter- and trans-disciplinary contributions from across arts, humanities and social sciences.
Please submit an abstract of 400 words of your proposed paper and a short biography to Francesco Angelini (francesco.angelini7unibo.it) ccd. to Adriana Turpin (a.turpiniesa.fr) by 15 February 2025. Notice of acceptance will be given by 5 March 2025.
Please note that this will be a fully in-person workshop.
There will be no attendance fees for participants.

Scientific Committee:
• Francesco Angelini, University of Bologna, Italy
• Massimiliano Castellani, University of Bologna, Italy
• Silvia Cerisola, Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy
• Silvia Emili, University of Bologna, Italy
• Elisabetta Lazzaro, Business School for the Creative Industries, University for the Creative Arts, UK
• Nathalie Moureau, RiRRa21, University Paul Valéry Montpellier 3, France
• Adriana Turpin, IESA, Paris, France

This workshop is supported by the PRIN 2022 project, funded by Ministero dell’Università e della Ricerca. Grant 2022M87K4F: Towards local development through a sustainable valorization of cultural heritage. Main principal investigator: Prof. Silvia Cerisola (Polytechnic University of Milan); local principal investigator: Dr. Silvia Emili (University of Bologna).