How a Vicenza train station became an international cultural stop

An Exibart address ↓ / Letterpress and printmaking workshops ↓ / International art exhibitions ↓ / Literary evenings, from a prizewinning Vicenza writer to contemporary poetry

HOW A VICENZA TRAIN STATION BECAME AN INTERNATIONAL CULTURAL STOP

Letterpress workshops, photography exhibitions and literary evenings in northern Italy.

Around 25 km by road from central Vicenza, an afternoon spent printing your own poster and an evening of poetry belong to the cultural life of a railway station. Stazione delle Arti, in Marano Vicentino, Veneto, occupies the former station building and hosts exhibitions, creative workshops and literary encounters. Its programmes offer an unusual way to explore Vicenza beyond Palladio, through the people making, printing and discussing art here today. [1, 2, 3, 4]

THE STATION AFTER DARK

Exibart includes the station in its art venue directory, documenting exhibitions, cinema and music here since the 2022 Celidonia festival. On summer festival evenings, the building becomes somewhere to spend several hours: art occupies different floors, the garden joins the exhibition route, and a kitchen and bar give visitors somewhere to pause between a show and a performance. [5, 6]

The programme makes the journey worth planning. Recent editions have combined conversations with exhibiting artists, printing demonstrations, documentary screenings and concerts after sunset. An exhibition visit can extend into dinner and live music, with the work and its makers sharing the same address. For things to do in Vicenza at night, the station offers contemporary culture with enough happening around it to build an evening. [6, 7]

LETTERPRESS AND PRINTMAKING WORKSHOPS IN VICENZA

At Tipi Strani, the station’s letterpress workshop, letters exist as pieces of wood and lead. You choose a shape, arrange the words, apply ink and press the composition onto paper. The studio’s published courses have taken participants through that entire process, from designing a poster to printing their own finished work. [3, 8]

The 2025 programme offered five hour letterpress workshops with just three participants per session. Other courses explored cyanotype printing, with its characteristic blue images, plant pigments and the making of a handbound zine. In the photography workshop, participants followed a roll of black and white film from taking photographs to developing and printing in the darkroom. These are concrete possibilities to look for when planning printmaking workshops in Italy or a creative weekend around paper, photography and books. [3]

The programme also reached into the evening: reading aloud classes ran until 21:00, while autobiographical writing sessions continued until 22:30, with dates extending into December. Summer festivals have opened the letterpress studio for evening demonstrations. Check the next workshop edition, including its timetable and teaching language, before arranging your visit. [3, 6]

INTERNATIONAL ART EXHIBITIONS, INSIDE THE STATION

A photographer presenting his work on the ground floor of this station had already won at Paris Photo. Nicolò Degiorgis brought Hidden Islam here in 2025, meeting visitors at the exhibition. His photographic book received the 2014 First PhotoBook award from Paris Photo and the Aperture Foundation, placing the station’s programme in direct contact with internationally recognised documentary photography. [6, 9]

The following summer, the first floor hosted Hitnes’s The Image Hunter, an expedition and wildlife art project covered by Audubon magazine. An evening screening accompanied the exhibition, bringing the artist’s journey through Audubon’s America into the station’s cinema programme. These past exhibitions show the scope of what has reached this small railway address, and why its next programme deserves attention. [7, 10]

LITERARY EVENINGS, FROM A PRIZEWINNING VICENZA WRITER TO CONTEMPORARY POETRY

Luigi Meneghello, the internationally acclaimed writer from Malo, Vicenza, won the Nonino Prize in 1992 and was awarded the Antonio Feltrinelli Prize for fiction in 2007. [11]

The Guardian placed him among Italy’s leading contemporary writers; Le Monde praised Libera nos a malo, his book about the village where he grew up. Published in English as Deliver Us in Northwestern World Classics, it was recommended by Matteo Melchiorre in a 2026 interview with The Booker Prizes. Meneghello also founded the Italian Studies department at the University of Reading. [12, 13, 14, 15]

His work opened La Stazione delle Lettere, the station’s series of four literary and poetry evenings in October 2026. University of Geneva scholar Luciano Zampese explored Meneghello’s childhood and language, followed across the series by contemporary poetry, spoken performance and a final encounter devoted to Primo Levi. A literary trip to Vicenza can include listening to these books being discussed in the territory that produced their language and stories. [4]

PLAN YOUR VISIT

Stazione delle Arti
Via Stazione 82, 36035 Marano Vicentino, Vicenza, Veneto, Italy.

Check the next workshops, exhibitions and evening events.

Literary evenings and general enquiries: info@s-ciao.it
Printmaking and photography workshop enquiries: tstipistrani@gmail.com

The workshops and exhibitions described above belong to documented past programmes; availability, fees and registration requirements depend on the next edition. The 2025 courses required advance registration and ARCI membership. [3, 6, 7]

La Stazione delle Lettere 2026: 2, 9, 15 and 20 October, at 20:30. Free entry, booking recommended, limited seating. [4]

Direct trains connect Vicenza and Marano Vicentino. Check the final service when planning an evening visit. [1]