The PartArt4OW SailingLab reached a new and wider audience on 26 June 2026, when the project was featured on TG Leonardo, the science programme broadcast on Rai 3. The segment, produced by journalist Simona Tanzini, explored emerging forms of participatory research and the evolving relationship between coastal communities and the marine environment, placing the SailingLab at the centre of the story.
The report is available to watch on the RaiNews platform: TG Leonardo – SailingLab PartArt4OW
The SailingLab, on national television
TG Leonardo introduced viewers to the SailingLab as a travelling research laboratory, one that uses sailing, on-site observation and audiovisual documentation as tools to investigate how people, coastal territories and the sea relate to one another. The segment described how the project brings together social geography, citizen science, participatory art and visual storytelling, presenting the sea as a space for shared knowledge and community involvement rather than a subject to be studied from a distance.
The piece also drew attention to two of PartArt4OW's sub-projects, Posidonia Art Reef and Tidal Orchards, as examples of how the project's research translates into concrete, place-based initiatives along the coast.
Voices behind the project
The broadcast included an interview with Chiara Certomà, social geographer at the MEMOTEF Department of Sapienza University of Rome and scientific coordinator of PartArt4OW, who leads the project's CO>SEA research group at the university's Faculty of Economics. The footage shown in the segment was produced by Federico Fornaro of Raw-News Visual Production Agency, whose long-standing work in visual documentation and participatory research has consistently focused on the ocean, sustainability and socio-environmental change.
A common good, in the spotlight
As the report makes clear, the SailingLab represents a distinctive way of doing marine research, one that brings scientific methods, artistic practice and visual narrative together to address pressing environmental questions while deepening the bond between society and the sea. Its appearance on a national broadcast such as TG Leonardo reflects a broader, growing interest in interdisciplinary, participatory research approaches that treat the ocean as a common good and as a meeting point between environment, community and scientific knowledge.
PartArt4OW – Participatory Art for Society Engagement with Ocean and Water has received funding from the European Union's Horizon Europe research and innovation programme. Views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the granting authority; neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.