dr Franco Bianchini
Dr Franco Bianchini is one of the Associate Directors of the Centre for Cultural Value, based at the University of Leeds, UK. Franco is also Senior Researcher at the Fitzcarraldo Foundation, Turin, Italy.
He worked as an academic in the UK from 1988-2020, at the University of Liverpool (1988-1991), Thames Polytechnic (1992), De Montfort University, Leicester (1992-2007) and Leeds Beckett University (2007-2016). He was Professor of Cultural Policy and Planning – and Director of the Culture, Place and Policy Institute (CPPI) – at the University of Hull from 2016-2020. CPPI was in charge of the evaluation of the processes, outcomes and impacts of Hull UK City of Culture 2017.
From 2010-2014 he was a member of the team preparing Matera’s successful bid for the European Capital of Culture 2019 title.
Dr Bianchini’s books include Focus on Festivals (co-edited with C. Newbold, C. Maughan and J. Jordan, Goodfellow, 2015), Urban Mindscapes of Europe (co-edited by G. Weiss-Sussex with F. Bianchini, Rodopi, 2006), Planning for the Intercultural City (with J. Bloomfield, Comedia, 2004), The Creative City (with C. Landry, Demos, 1995) and Cultural Policy and Urban Regeneration: the West European Experience (co-editor, with M. Parkinson, Manchester University Press, 1993).
His research interests range from the role of culture in urban regeneration (with a particular focus on port cities and on European Cities/Capitals of Culture), to cultural diversity and interculturalism as resources for innovation in urban policy, and the development of urban cultural strategies in the context of current political, economic, health and environmental crises.
photo: copyright – University of Hull