Rediscovering and re-functionalizing a forgotten heritage through digital representation techniques. Enzo Venturelli's aquarium-retilarium for a Museum of Japanese Comics and Animation in Turin

The paper aims to explore the use of digital technologies to make the spaces of a currently disused building -the Enzo Venturelli aquarium-retilarium in Turin- accessible and navigable. The study also analyses the interdisciplinarity between drawing and representation, exhibition design, and museography. Thanks to digital technologies, these disciplines, which are constantly evolving, now explore design and visual communication through complementary dynamics. Digital models enable designers to model, communicate, document, analyze, and share their ideas on platforms accessible from desktops and smartphones. Thanks to virtual environments, this digital revolution involves greater functional and representational complexity than in the past. The design strategy can follow two main approaches: focus exclusively on the exhibition content, neglecting the host building, or consider the space as an integral part of the exhibition experience. Considering the space, the exhibition layout and visitors together means shifting to a comprehensive museum vision, intended as an ecosystem where these three elements are interconnected and occur together to enhance and communicate cultural heritage. This paper considers the museum ecosystem as a unicum, aiming to reuse the volumetric and spatial complexity of an already scenic building by rethinking its paths and functions. The proposed virtual environment constitutes the digital ecosystem of a museum where the environment (container) and exhibition design layout (content) give rise to a three-dimensional space that can be navigated according to virtual and immersive reality principles, engaging the public. Thanks to digital technologies, the design proposal can offer new insights into rehabilitating and enhancing a currently inaccessible place, reintroducing it to the community as a Museum of Japanese Comics and Animation and its digital replica made accessible through a virtual tour. The building intended to house this proposal is the aquarium-retilarium in Turin's Michelotti Park. Currently, the building shows obvious signs of degradation due to abandonment. Although the City of Turin has planned restoration and maintenance work to create an indoor theatre, the debate about its future use remains open. In this context, digital technologies can help to imagine possible new uses for this forgotten and, to date, inaccessible heritage.