The manifestation of Luci d´artista, a reference point for contemporary art, was born in Turin in 1998 on the initiative of Fiorenzo Alfieri. 12 artists are invited (Vasco Are, Francesco Casorati, Enrico De Paris, Richi Ferrero, Carmelo Giammello, Emanuele Luzzati, Luigi Mainolfi, Mario Molinari, Luigi Nervo, Giulio Paolini, Luigi Stoisa, Francesco Tabusso) and two young artists, Domenico Luca Pannoli and Enrica Borghi - selected through a national competition of ideas. The sixth edition of 2004 proposes in Turin (among other things) the work of Mario Merz, a famous exponent of the poor art who died in 2003, called The flight of numbers: The first numbers of the Fibonacci sequence are placed on the Mole Antonelliana, and they report, as often happens in Merzian poetics, of the apparent chaos in the development of life forms. Daniel Buren's installation called Flying Carpet is also scenographic and photogenic.
The event, which has been successful since its first edition, makes the Piedmontese metropolis appear dressed in lights and attracts numerous Italian and foreign tourists every year.
The same initiative was also adopted in the city of Salerno in 2006 and, ten years later, in the city of Pescara. An ideal twinning between the three cities, Turin, Salerno and Pescara, produced a reciprocal exchange. During the event (November-January) part of the lights adopted the previous year by the Piedmontese capital were exhibited in Salerno and Pescara, as well as other previously unpublished works commissioned. In the following years, on the other hand, the city of Turin adopted various works from the Campania and Abruzzo districts, thus beginning a real "twinning" with an exchange of the works of the three participating cities. In 2009, the 25-meter Christmas tree located in Piazza Portanova appeared to be the highest artificial-type in Italy.
In 2011 the Salerno event sees the participation of the artist Nello Ferrigno. Particularly successful of the Salerno edition is the theme of the enchanted garden, which envelops the historic city center with variegated lights and always different, making the Villa Comunale di Salerno an authentic fairy-tale garden with magicians, sorcerers, luminous tunnels and enchanted figures.
