The city of Gorizia is preparing to inaugurate, in the second half of December 2025, the DAG - Digital Art Gallery — an urban and cultural regeneration project that will transform the historic Bombi Gallery into a cutting-edge exhibition space dedicated to immersive digital art.
Originally an underground corridor during the Habsburg era, later used as an air raid shelter, the Bombi Gallery has now been converted into a 300-meter-long path, 100 meters of which are entirely covered with state-of-the-art LEDs. Overall, the covered digital surface area reaches 1,000 square meters, offering significant visual and sensorial potential.



The project: between urban regeneration and emerging languages
The transformation of Galleria Bombi into DAG is not a simple installation: it represents an operation to enhance the historical-architectural heritage combined with an ambitious cultural project. The project is an integral part of the GO! 2025 program – Nova Gorica / Gorizia European Capital of Culture 2025, and aims to be a structural legacy beyond the celebration year. According to the regional and municipal authorities involved, DAG aims to become a stable hub for digital art, capable of attracting not only a local audience but also international visitors, students, researchers, and enthusiasts of new technologies and contemporary media.

The author chosen for the inauguration
Refik Anadol, one of the most globally recognized multimedia artists in the field of data-generated art and immersive media, has been selected to open DAG.Anadol—with his international studio, which brings together designers, data scientists, and researchers—has built a solid reputation in data aesthetics: his works have already been exhibited in prestigious venues such as MoMA, Centre Pompidou-Metz, Guggenheim Bilbao, Serpentine Galleries, and many others. The inaugural installation is titled Data Tunnel. It is a site-specific project for the Gorizia gallery: a “digital tunnel” that completely transforms the walls with projections, sound, light, and movement, created using an artificial intelligence model called “Large Nature Model.”

Data Tunnel: Immersion, Perception, and Digital Nature
The Data Tunnel work aims to generate a fully immersive experience: the gallery walls become a living space, animated by images that evoke natural landscapes, environmental dynamics, and organic textures; sounds and visions change in harmony, producing a sensorial dimension that transforms the journey into a "journey between data and perception." According to Anadol’s studio, the use of the Large Nature Model and public environmental datasets reflects an ethical approach to data: no personal data, no confidential information—only images, landscapes, and natural memories made visible in a transformed context.The technical setup is top-notch: the tunnel will be equipped with a next-generation curved LED system, spatialized audio, and infrastructure independent of the tunnel’s historic structure, to ensure both safety and the reversibility of the project.





Sponsorship, management and public nature of the intervention
The DAG project is supported by a consortium that includes the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region, the Municipality of Gorizia, the regional tourism promotion company PromoTurismoFVG, the cultural organization MEET – Digital Culture Center, and the Ministry of Culture. Admission will be managed by Erpac FVG; access to the gallery during the inauguration will be free, as a sign of openness and accessibility to the public.
The public and collaborative nature of the project aims to make DAG not just an exhibition space, but a stable cultural hub: a meeting place for technology, research, tourism, and the community.

The importance for tourism, territory and cultural future
The creation of DAG represents a significant opportunity for Gorizia and the entire Friuli Venezia Giulia region: the gallery combines architectural regeneration, contemporary cultural offerings, and tourism potential. In a context of international recognition—thanks to Anadol’s fame and the quality of the inaugural work—Gorizia can position itself as a reference point for digital art in Italy and Europe. This attracts not only art enthusiasts, but a wider audience: young people, students, curators, and tourists interested in immersive experiences, innovation, and reinterpreted cultural heritage.At the same time, the project can stimulate a virtuous cycle: urban revitalization, new economic opportunities, international visibility, cultural education, and awareness of the relationship between technology, nature, and aesthetic perception.



Limits and unknowns
Despite the concrete and well-documented elements (opening date, dimensions, inaugural work, technical structure, supporters), some aspects remain to be defined with certainty:
• Future projects after “Data Tunnel”: at the moment there are no detailed public communications on upcoming installations or exhibition programming.
• Durability of use : whether the gallery will become a permanent institution, with rotating artists, or will remain on a temporary basis.
• The cultural and territorial budget : how much it will actually contribute to tourism, the local economy and community participation.

For further information, please visit PromoTurismoFVG