Re-Inventing Intergenerational Relationships Through Participatory Art: A Study About Duetos/Installation-Performance

Participatory art today is shaped by collaboration between artists and professionals in the social, cultural, and educational sectors, by funding programs and cultural policy agendas. It also involves artists who explore ways to engage citizens in their creative processes, including acting with others (co-creating) and/or acting for others (re-inventing) toward fairer realities and relationships. Viewed within these intersections, the chapter delves into the case of the Duetos installation-performance, where pairs of senior/junior performers act as co-creators. The study comprises two main components: the critical analysis of the application document for the participatory art Project Fazer Presente (which includes Duetos), addressing issues of aging social construction, and democracy in the cultural sphere; and the presentation of both the creative process and the final result of Duetos, framed by this discussion. The study aims to demonstrate how Duetos, by acting with seniors and juniors as co-creators of a common artistic process, acted to foster fairer relationships between generations that are not only distant but also territorially and socio-culturally differentiated. Furthermore, it intends to show how Duetos, through strategies and procedural choices of the creative process, reacted toward the social goal of “active” aging as outlined in the Project Fazer Presente.