“What would the world be without infrastructure?”
This question guided us in curating and designing Evolutio, an immersive and interactive exhibition promoted by Webuild and hosted at the Ara Pacis Museum in Rome.
The exhibition explores the crucial role of infrastructure in shaping Italy’s history and collective progress, revealing how roads, bridges, dams, railways, and subways have transformed the country and the way people live.
 

Evolutio is the fifth exhibition we developed for Webuild — and the first presented in Rome.
This exhibition, hosted at the Ara Pacis Museum in Rome, explores how roads, bridges, dams, railways, subways, and architectural works have shaped Italy’s transformation from an agricultural nation to a modern industrial society.

Combining historical memory, technology, and immersive scenography, the exhibition invites visitors to explore archives, interactive installations, and digital content, discovering how infrastructure has improved mobility, daily life, and social cohesion.

The curatorial concept transforms the exhibition path into a connected narrative across three linked layers:

Visual Memory — Archival photographs, documents, and historical materials reveal the evolution of infrastructure as part of Italy’s collective identity.

Connected Narrative — Multimedia installations, projections, and interactive timelines bridge past, present, and future, turning historical content into sensory spatial experience.

Participatory Scenography — Physical spaces are intentionally designed for interaction, inviting visitors to engage directly with the social and cultural significance of infrastructure.

exhibition structure

The exhibition is organized chronologically into thematic areas reflecting the essential human needs that infrastructures have fulfilled — Energy, Water, Transport, and Urban Development — showing how they have shaped societies over time.

1930s: electrification, energy self-sufficiency, industrial expansion
1940s: dams, aqueducts, and water infrastructure
1950s: subways connecting rapidly growing suburbs
1960s: hospitals, airports, cultural centers, and stadiums
1970s: highways, bridges, and railways that redefined distance and mobility

Each decade is enriched by visual reconstructions of everyday life, based on research and archival materials coordinated by Leftloft in collaboration with Istituto Luce and Teche Rai.

At the heart of the exhibition lies an in-depth focus on people — a constant dialogue between past and present, showing how work has evolved over time and paying tribute to the hidden heroes behind these great works.

exhibition design & installation

Each concept layer is activated through site-specific installations — physical, multimedia, or interactive — all equally contributing to a unified and immersive narrative.

1900 Installation: the exhibition opens with an evocative scene from the early 20th century, composed of photographs, sounds, and objects that recreate the atmosphere of an Italy still poor and rural. In this space, a clearly visible question invites reflection: How did Italy become one of the world’s most industrialized nations?

Le Torce: visitors use handheld torches to cast light on archival images, gradually revealing modern urban scenes superimposed onto historical views, highlighting the transformation from past to present.

The Interactive Metro: subway lines displayed on illuminated plexiglass panels demonstrate how cities evolved and connected across time.

The Distance Dashboard: by turning a knob along a timeline, visitors see how travel times between locations shrink — distances measured not in kilometers but in hours — making the impact of infrastructure tangible.

Participatory Scenography: immersive settings allow visitors to walk in water behind a digital dam, board subway cars that replicate cities around the globe, traverse tunnels and suspended bridges, and explore digital cityscapes transitioning between day and night.

The journey culminates in the meta-bridge, a scenographic model of the Strait of Messina Bridge, creating a visual and symbolic link between the exhibition and the Ara Pacis.

What we did

Curatorial concept and artistic direction

Scenography and visual design across thematic areas

Immersive and interactive installations - in collaboration with TheBuss

Integrated visual system: signage, digital materials, communication

Scenographic modeling of the meta-bridge

Guidelines for touring versions of the exhibition

collaborators

The exhibition was curated, realized, and coordinated by Leftloft, which involved multimedia artists and technical specialists to create an immersive and meaningful experience.

TheBuss - setup design and immersive multimedia installations
Solian Clerici – setup design
Manuel D’Onofrio – 3D modeling
EEZE – motion design
Giovanni Farese – scientific curator
Fidogroup - Exhibition Setup & Technology
Marco Fracasso – sound design
Anna Frigo – motion design
Alessandro Gabini – motion design
Alyssa Gagliardi – technology development
Dario Gavezotti – technology development
Alessandro Lucchini – motion design
Luca Scarzella – motion design

Video – TheBuss
Filming – Ivana Gloria, Elena Chiappa
Editing – Ivana Gloria