Friday, October 24th at 5:00 PM, the exhibition Mario Rigoni Stern. Ecology, Civil Engagement, and Care for the Environment will open at Palazzo Bomben in Treviso, organized by the Benetton Foundation for Studies and Research, in collaboration with the Municipality of Asiago and the Mario Rigoni Stern Archive, curated by Massimo Rossi and Gianbattista Rigoni Stern, open from Saturday, October 25th to Sunday, December 21st, 2025, and accompanied by a calendar of public events.

The exhibition re-proposes and enhances, in a new setting, the archive materials previously exhibited in Asiago for the centenary of the birth of the Altopiano writer (Le Carceri museum, December 8, 2022 - April 30, 2023), but above all invites to rediscover, in a new section, Mario Rigoni Stern's civil engagement for a correct relationship with the natural and animal world, through his intellectual activity, his relationships with artists, numerous contributions to newspapers and magazines, master classes, interviews, collaboration with the Veneto Region for the drafting of the Asiago Charter.

A new opportunity, therefore, to make known the important archive preserved in Asiago, his hometown, and to reconsider today his profound reflection on the relationship between man and nature, on the true meaning of the word "ecology," on the salvific role of the environment and places, as he reminds us in Men, Woods, and Bees from 1983: "mountains, plains, rivers, seas, where to find serenity and balance; to the point that one might think that violence, anguish, living badly, apathy, and loneliness are largely attributable to the environment generated by our civilization."

The exhibition path:

- The new section of the exhibition, designed by the Benetton Foundation with BLab Design Studio, delves into Mario Rigoni Stern's attention and initiatives aimed at environmental and natural community conservation. Domenico Luciani, architect and former director of the Benetton Foundation, explores the writer's tireless civil engagement through collaborations with newspapers and numerous public interventions.

Also highlighted will be the special collaboration of Mario Rigoni Stern with artists who enriched his writings with lithographs, paintings, and engravings: Pino Guzzonato, Aldo De Vidal, Armando Pizzinato, and Guerrino Bonaldo. The images by French photographer Loïc Seron portray the great writer and his "Heimat."

In the other six sections (developed, in terms of scientific content, within the Asiago exhibition, with the support of archivist Ines Gheno and under the valuable supervision of Gianbattista Rigoni Stern, the writer's son), the exhibition offers a reflection, through archive documents, on the history of Mario Rigoni Stern, the many facets of his public and private image, and his deep love for the mountains, nature, the environment, and the relationship between the individual and the territory.

- Giuseppe Mendicino curated the section Mario Rigoni Stern and Primo Levi. Friendship between books, mountains, and imprisonment, delving into the close friendship and elective affinity between the two writers;

- Chiara Visentin with A View from Above explored the theme of environmental activism and the protection of the Altopiano;

- Chiara Stefani focused on the archival documentation related to the writer's naturalistic and environmental interest in the section Living within Nature;

- Ada Cavazzani, with the evocative title Writing Why, For What?, addressed Mario Rigoni Stern's very early vocation for writing, experienced as an existential need, delving into some themes that remain a constant reference throughout his literary activity;

- Anna Maria Cavallarin, a scholar of Rigoni's themes, with Since in the World We Are All Villagers, examined the dense network of human and cultural contacts emerging from the writer's papers, creating a mental map of affections and relationships;

- Francesca Chiesa, in the section Small Homeland and Memory, delves into the close bond with the "Heimat," which materializes in a dense scenario of places and people converging in the work The Seasons of Giacomo.

The exhibition and graphic communication design project is curated by BLab Design by Antonio, Cristina, and Roberto Busellato with Alice Chiavazza, in collaboration with the Benetton Foundation.

The exhibition, aiming to make the archival document more accessible, utilizes a multimedia communication system organized through light-boxes, wall video projections, sound installations, wall panels with captions, and display cases, to create an immersive environment and a multisensory experience.

During the exhibition period, there will be in-depth meetings, school initiatives, book presentations, and public screenings.

In conjunction with the exhibition, a book from the Memorie Minime series, dedicated to Mario Rigoni Stern, is also published by the Benetton Foundation for Studies and Research, in co-edition with Antiga. The volume, which takes its title from the exhibition, is a small tribute to the great writer who did so much and wrote for the landscape, the mountains, for a truly ecological view of the places of life, the world, starting from his Asiago, and reproposes two of his short writings: the original version of Ecology is not a Fashion from 1976, which will be accompanied by six short stories and lithographs by the Cadore painter Aldo De Vidal, later published under the title The Dance of the Roe Deer and Other Stories, circulated at the time in few copies, in which Rigoni Stern reflects on the use of the noun "ecology," then recently introduced in scientific literature, popularized by the environmental movement and entered common usage, but immediately worn out by interpretations and unconscious uses; and A View from Above, a sort of geonarration on the Veneto landscape observed from above, a lesson in human geography made through a detailed and deeply felt analysis by someone who made his "small homeland" (the Altopiano, the Veneto) a universal place.

The texts interact with some fragments of artist books, engravings, and watercolors by authors somehow linked to the writing and life of Mario Rigoni Stern, particularly Guerrino Bonaldo, Aldo De Vidal, and Pino Guzzonato.

The volume is also introduced by two contributions from the exhibition curators, Massimo Rossi and Gianbattista Rigoni Stern.

The exhibition is held under the patronage of: Ministry of Defense, Province of Treviso,

City of Treviso, National Alpine Association, CAI Veneto, Legambiente. 

Public opening on Friday, October 24th at 5:00 PM

Open from Saturday, October 25th to Sunday, December 21st, 2025

Friday 3:00 PM - 7:00 PM, Saturday and Sunday 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM, 3:00 PM - 7:00 PM

Palazzo Bomben, via Cornarotta 7, Treviso

Single entrance fee: 5 euros

Guided tours, also for schools, by reservation