Ten years after the passing of Pinuccio Sciola on May 13, 2016, Sardinia continues to pay homage to one of its most internationally recognized artists, capable of transforming stone into a universal language, a dialogue between peoples, public art, and sound experimentation.
For its tenth anniversary, the Pinuccio Sciola Foundation has promoted a comprehensive program of cultural, artistic, and charitable initiatives that will run through 2026. The goal is to showcase not only the artistic legacy of the master from San Sperate, but also his contemporary vision of international connections, innovation, and inclusion. But this is a work in progress, as new proposals are added daily, in a whirlwind that only his genius and intuition could generate, and which continues to create relentlessly.
At the heart of the celebrations will be the Sant'Arte Festival 2026, scheduled for May 29th to 31st at the Giardino Sonoro in San Sperate, a symbolic location for Sciola's work. This year's festival, which revolves around the theme "Urban Connections," will bring together art, music, science, architecture, and new technologies in an open dialogue between disciplines and cultures.
"Here we celebrate Saint Art every day, without a specific reason or date," Pinuccio Sciola used to say. "The sense of beauty has become a common conscience, to be preserved and venerated. Now it's a matter of infecting the whole of Sardinia, and making art a sort of festivity, to be celebrated at any time."
Three days of debates, music, and art, starting with the extraordinary reopening of his home at Via Marongiu 21 in San Sperate, which Sciola transformed into a sort of literary salon, where he could meet and engage with other artists, university professors, and politicians, forging new connections every day. A plate of ravioli—cooked to perfection by the maestro—became a pretext for conversations about art, life, and the world. Sciola was a man capable of bridging distances and differences: he shared the same passion with a young farmer and a Nobel Prize winner. Connections with Japan will also be evident, following the extraordinary success of the sounding stones at Expo Osaka 2025.
