INTANGIBLE HERITAGE – ART BASEL x BENEDETTO CAMERANA STUDIO
Every architectural project is born digitally first, and only when its digital twin is complete does the project take shape in the real world. Imagine designing a building with no constraints of cost, materials, or feasibility.
That is what Benedetto Camerana has done with the Roarington Art Center, a contemporary art center in the metaverse. As Fritz Kaiser told the Art Basel blog, “in every city of value—digital or real—there must be a place dedicated to art, reflection, and shared imagination. Here we have created something new: a museum that is not a replica of reality, but opens up a new way of experiencing art in the twenty-first century.”
The project therefore marks the beginning of a new chapter for contemporary art, as Payal Uttam emphasized in the article.
The Art Center will open in 2026 and is promoted by one of the world’s most important collectors, Michael Ringier. It will host the largest exhibition ever dedicated to Californian artist Matt Mullican, featuring works in digital form, metaverse-native pieces, and interactive performances.
The experience will be immersive and dynamic. Access to the Center is marked by an exceptionally long wall that redraws the outline of the landscape: a metal slab—one of Camerana’s stylistic signatures, recalling the workshop wall of Stone Island’s design office in Milan—interrupted by a central cut. Beyond it, visitors cross a bridge suspended over the Museum’s garden, a prelude to and backdrop for the exhibition areas.
We are in a city dedicated to car culture: the Center’s interiors, from staircases to doorways, echo the curves and flowing lines of automobile bodywork. The space—around six thousand square meters, yet potentially infinite—includes eight galleries displaying works of every kind, all rendered in three dimensions, complete with the reflections of glass.
A museum to explore: a truly new and unprecedented cultural experience.