Maybe, when it comes to Naplesthe collective obsession is to explain its identity, capture its genius, analyze its miseries and problems to arrive at a univocal and clear definition. But Naples, more often than not, escapes any classification and any cliché. Because it is the oxymoron city par excellence even if abroad – let’s not forget – they think of our country as an immense Naples: the sun, the sea, pizza, spaghetti.
It’s a Monday and the city is full of tourists, especially foreigners. A sign of extreme vitality, if not of rebirth: «Guagliaò now more people come here than Rome», says a taxi driver in front of the Central Station. Braggadocio? Not much. According to the Tourism Observatory, last year the city exceeded 20 million tourists with a peak recorded in September (the month, not surprisingly, in which San Gennaro is celebrated) with 1 million 830 thousand tourists.
The ranking on the quality of life of Sun 24 Hoursreleased in December, puts her at the 104th place (out of 107). 2025 was an important year for Naples because it celebrated the 2500 years of historyhaving been founded on 21 December 475 BC. C. But the conditional is a must because according to several scholars it would be a (half) hoax, a symbolic date placed on the day of the winter solstice because Naples, in ancient times, was considered one of the sacred cities. The birthday celebrations, however, continue this year too with initiatives, cultural projects and events as European capital of sport 2026.
Walking around the city, one fact immediately catches your eye: Naples is alive, in turmoil, perhaps even capable of overcoming the prejudice of a city submerged by unsolvable problems. And the celebrations for the 2,500th anniversary are, in part, a confirmation of this because they do not limit themselves to looking at the past but are an opportunity to define a new cultural, social and economic trajectory. Between open construction sites, widespread projects and a season of institutional collaboration, the city is trying to carve out a role for itself as the capital of the Mediterranean, a laboratory of social and creative innovation. As the prefect explains Michele Di Baripresident of the National Committee “Neapolis 2500” (which includes, among others, the director Pupi Avati and the former Minister of Culture Gennaro Sangiuliano), «celebrating this anniversary is not about looking back, but about projecting our legacy into a sustainable, inclusive and innovative future».
Naples is a complex mosaic, made up of different neighborhoods and clear contrasts: from the seafront and the historic center (Chiaia, Spaccanapoli, Quartieri Spagnoli) to the suburbs such as Scampia, Barra, San Giovanni a Teduccio. Areas that for decades have been a symbol of marginality and fragility, but which today are transformed thanks to university residences, technological hubs, artistic laboratories and social hubs. «Naples has already proven to be a resilient city, capable of facing new challenges by knowing how to make the most of every resource and draw on sustainable economic opportunities», explains the Prefect. In the city splendor and wound, beauty and fragility; popular culture and cultured creativity coexist, often dialogue, creating that “city in the balance” that escapes any definitiveness and resists any attempt to enclose it in a single story.
The Prefect of Naples Michele di Bari president of the Neapolis 2500 National Committee
(HANDLE)
This dual soul of Naples – masterpiece and disaster, beauty and fragility – is profoundly reflected in contemporary culture. Writers like Elena Ferrantedirectors like Paolo Sorrentino (His latest film has just been released in theaters Grace), musicians like Pino Daniele and the stories of everyday life transfigured in TV series such as Gomorrah have transformed the city into a narrative and visual laboratory that highlights contradictions and greatness.
It is from this awareness, that the city is plural, complex, all contrasts and energy, that the Napoli 2500 project took shape: give back to Naples the richness of its many souls, making culture not an occasional event, but a strategic lever for development, work and social participation. Audiovisual productions, sustainable tourism, craftsmanship, historical and creative professions become concrete tools to offer opportunities to young people, to create closer ties between communities, and to make culture a stable presence in neighborhoods, from the library to the theater workshop, from the artisan workshop to the community cinema.
The symbolic initiatives of this new cultural season tell of Naples’ ambition to transform its history into a project for the future. TO Royal Palace until January 25th you can admire the exhibition on Toto, curated by Alessandro Nicosia and Marino Niola, which celebrates the inseparable bond between the great actor and the city through photographs, films, costumes and multimedia installations. Not a simple homage to an artist, but a declaration of love towards Naples as a city capable of creating civilization, between humour, irony, melancholy, tradition and renewal.
Inclusive contemporary art also takes shape alongside memory: Oculus Spei, multimedia and interactive installation of Annalaura di Luggo al Museum of the Treasure of San Gennaro (which also became a short film) led people on a “journey of hope” through five symbolic Holy Doors. People with disabilities from all over the world and residents of Naples become protagonists of a story of inclusion, faith and rebirth.
If popular culture, literature, cinema and music tell of the wounds and dreams of the city, then the Napoli 2500 project translates this narrative capacity into concrete action: the city becomes a stage and a laboratory, where memory and innovation dialogue, and contradictions are transformed into opportunities for growth, participation and rebirth. «Neapolitan culture», says the Prefect of Bari, «is one of the most lively and recognizable expressions of Italian identity abroad. In a cosmopolitan world, it is also an expression of openness, interconnections and multifaceted identity. Neapolitan culture is a trademark, which emancipates itself in everyday life.”
The futuristic Monte Sant’Angelo stop on metro line 7
(IPA)
For the mayor Gaetano Manfredi, Napoli 2500 must not turn into an ephemeral celebration, «but it must be a project destined to leave a lasting mark: «The real celebration», he explains, «it is in the awareness of having done something lasting, which remains, not just a showcase for tourists but the seal of a capital that has rediscovered its centrality in Italy and Europe. From large urban transformation projects in the suburbs to the valorization of the historic center, to major sporting events: Naples is demonstrating that it knows how to overcome all challenges by creating development and inclusion.”
Crime, the youth unemployment rate (which is around 41 percent according to Istat), the flight of young people, especially high school and university graduates, towards Northern Italy or abroad, due to better job opportunities and higher wages which has seen Campania lose over 48 thousand young people between the ages of 25 and 34 in the three-year period 2022-2024 are so many thorns of an enigma city, which harbors so many opposites: one of the few European capitals that has preserved the proletariat in the womb, eliminating the border between the periphery and the centerdeveloping the ability to anticipate social transformations; a capital where reality changes for better or worse sooner than elsewhere, and has very little work to offer but produces artists in impressive quantities.
At sunset, from the San Martino viewpoint, Naples appears as a living body that grows in spurts, never linearly: a city in progress, which lives on its double soul made of contradictions and hope. The prince of San Severo, the one of the veiled Christ and of the alchemical experiments, left it written that “the existence of great virtues without great vices is not given to human weakness”. In Naples virtues and vices are raised to power.
