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Michelangelo Pistoletto is one of the most important artists alive in Italy and founding member of the Arte Povera movement. Cittadellarte, an art foundation created by him, embraces the idea that art should play an active role in everyday life and act responsibly as a transformer for all different areas of life.

We are delighted to have had him as our first guest to interview in the Lago Appartamento for our series of post futurist manifesto dialogues that we keep conducting during the Milan Design Week.

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100 years ago, in February 1909, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni and others announced the futuristic manifesto in Italy. They wanted to express the spirit of their era, wanted to break with all the conventions of the 19th century and replace them with new values.

We all know that the futurism of the 20th century went terribly wrong at one point and eventually ended in fascism. However, it is important to understand that initially it was all about liberation and freedom – aesthetically, politically and socially. The value system that derived from this, however, was aggression, hate and the celebration of the hard skills – all which became the conventions of the 20th century.

100 years later the world as we know it is collapsing before our eyes. The futurism of the 20th century has reached its end and it is well time to create a post-futurist manifesto that seeks to define the true nature of the 21st century - and to create a new value system to replace the ruins of the old one.

Since the Milan design week is probably the most important yearly gathering of the international design world, it seems a great opportunity to seek to create a post futurist manifesto - in dialogue with some of the current ‘movers and shakers’ of the design world.