PLACEBO
Placebo is a curatorial collective born from the collaboration of three young people with different backgrounds, united by a shared passion for art and the belief that dialogue between works, contexts, and people can create authentic experiences. We are curious observers, attentive listeners, and skilled organizers.
Mission
To create authentic artistic experiences in forgotten or hard-to-reach places, fostering dialogue between emerging artists, the local area, and local communities through exhibitions, site-specific installations, and artist residencies.
Vision
A world where art reaches the places that the art world overlooks—and transforms them.
Who we are
Placebo is a contemporary art collective founded in Pennabilli, a small village in the Montefeltro hills of Emilia-Romagna. Our name is no coincidence. We believe that art is a cure.
Not a metaphor, but a genuine remedy for the soul, for the body, and for a region that has been forgotten. Just as a placebo works precisely because you believe in it, we believe in art’s transformative power to heal, to awaken, and to breathe new life into what lies dormant.
We were born out of a desire for cultural renewal, inheriting a place where art and community have long been intertwined, and deliberately choosing to carry on this tradition. Now, with our members spread across Europe, Placebo is moving beyond its origins—bringing that same sense of rootedness to new cities, new contexts, and new collaborations.
We create spaces where young artists can explore their practice in dialogue with a living place: its stones, its stories, its people. For us, art isn’t a white cube. It’s a connection. It lives in the streets, on the walls, in the encounter between a work of art and someone who wasn’t expecting it. We believe that art can revitalize any place, and that it is often the smallest places that spark the most urgent transformations.
Team
Matilde Dani
is a curator and project manager based in Berlin, with a background in International Relations and a specialisation in postcolonial museum practices. Trained at the University of Bologna and the European University Institute in Florence, she works across independent and institutional contexts in Berlin's art scene. She co-founded Placebo Collective in 2024, bringing together her roots in Pennabilli and her European trajectory.
Giulia Conti
Giulia is a curator and project manager, based in Milan, specializing in communication within the arts and cultural sector. She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Urbino Carlo Bo and later completed a master’s degree at IULM University in Milan. She currently works at an art gallery focused on contemporary art, where she is involved in the development and coordination of cultural projects.
Ex members
Emma Mariotti
is a co-founder of Placebo Collective and a graphic designer with a background in architecture, trained at the Politecnico di Milano. Born in Padova and raised between Padova and Pennabilli, she eventually chose to make the borgo her home. Her architectural eye shaped the visual identity of Placebo, a practice built on the same principles as the collective itself: attention to space, to context, and to what already exists before anything new is added.
Lorenzo Ricci
is a co-founder of Placebo Collective and the mind behind its experiential dimension. Born in Novafeltria and deeply tied to Pennabilli, he has always brought the art of food into Placebo's events and exhibitions, as a curatorial gesture in its own right. For Lorenzo, cooking and art share the same root: the ability to create an encounter, to make a place feel inhabited, to turn a moment into a memory.
