The body and the city. A case study of collaborative performing arts in the urban space

Through the presentation of Body meets city, a collective walking and performance experience in the public space staged in New York in 2015, this study reflects on the possibilities and tools available to artistic practice to determine, question and re-think the relationships between the body and the urban environment. The first phase of the project involved local research, contact and discussion with artists and other agents, and the second phase culminated in a public art event. Starting from a relatively large base of similar experiences staged in different parts of the world, and from the theoretical proposals of authors such as Lefebvre or Careri, Body meets city essentially highlights the artistic and collaborative nature of its component actions, together with the importance of the local context in which they are enacted.