Today, Thursday 4^th May 2017, at MAO Museo d’Arte Orientale (Museum of Oriental Art), the series of meetings organized on the occasion of the exhibition Dall’antica alla nuova Via della Seta (From the ancient to the new Silk Road) continues. Taking the cue from the exhibition and the permanent collections of the museum, the speakers who will take part in the event will offer a precious opportunity to think about the new cultural challenges of the Eurasian vision that the New Silk Road wants to offer. The cooperation with Il Mulino, ToChina and the Polytechnic University of Turin gives the opportunity to talk about this topic under different points of view, with an interdisciplinary approach and with high-profile international speakers.

Today, talking about China often means facing the unprecedented process of urbanisation which is currently taking place, and not only as architects or city planners. For this reason, the percentage of the urban population went from 18% in 1978 to more than 55% in 2017, and every year more than 16 million people who live in rural areas move to the cities.

The Nuova Via della Seta (New Silk Road) is the latest important government project that wants to support the central role of the Country on a global scale, a position that our country had many times in the past, for example from the mercantile point of view, and that now it is forcefully reaffirmed thanks to the fundamental role given to urbanisation.

Different levels of government, driven by the thriving real estate market and by the profits coming from the right to build, have defined new development areas, scientific parks and industrial areas in ambitious plans for new developments and new towns. This is a strategic tool by which local governments increase their local revenues, attract companies and business activities and, more generally, spread the Chinese “urban dream”.

A special and symbolic example of the Nuova Via della Seta ambitions is the newly founded city of Lanzhou, built by the Government in the North central China as the focal point and the hub of the new expansion towards the West. Lanzhou has been recently visited by the Polytechnic University of Turin, the first western university to carry out field studies in this Chinese city.

Free entry to the conferences until all available seats are taken.

Free tickets will be distributed from half an hour before the beginning of the conference.