June 2026 — A nineteenth-century cabinet of curiosities in the Italian Alps becomes the setting for Mondo Novo’s next project.
The Museo Filippa in Rimella, in the Valsesia valley of Piedmont, is the oldest civic museum in the region. It was founded in 1836 by Giovanni Battista Filippa, a soldier who had fought in Napoleon’s campaigns in Spain and spent years as an emigrant before returning to his mountain village with an extraordinary collection of objects from across the world. His intention was to open a window onto a wider reality for the people of a community that, at the time, could only be reached on foot from the nearest town.
In 2025, the museum received 4,222 votes in the FAI Luoghi del Cuore census, placing it among the funded sites in the 2025 national call. It is a place that has survived on the devotion of those who know it, and that very few people beyond the valley have ever encountered.
Mondo Novo has received a commission to develop a new project for the museum. In July, Carlo De Togni will travel to Rimella for a first residency — a reconnaissance, and an act of care toward a place that has been quietly holding its stories for nearly two centuries. What comes next will be shaped by what the place has to say.
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