2. Marco Cavallo, symbol of the psychiatric revolution that began in Trieste in 1973. Itinerari Basagliani, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Remembering patients in psychiatric hospitals
For centuries, people experiencing mental distress were segregated from wider society and confined in residential institutions. Within these facilities, they often endured prison-like conditions, mistreatment, and neglect, rather than receiving proper care. In recent years, however, innovative forms of commemoration have emerged, including survivor-led walking tours and artistic performances held at former institutions. In the 1970s, reformist psychiatrists and anti-psychiatry movements called for radical change: they advocated the closure of asylums and the reintegration of patients into their communities. While professionals’ roles in this process have been recognised, the contributions of patients themselves still deserve greater attention.
A particularly striking case of collective memory concerns the legacy of Franco Basaglia( 1924 – 1980), the Italian pioneer of deinstitutionalisation, and his patients. While directing various asylums across Italy, Basaglia sought to improve conditions for both patients and staff. In 1973, at the San Giovanni psychiatric hospital in Trieste, a group of artists, doctors, and patients created a large blue sculpture known as Marco Cavallo(“ Marco the Horse”). The statue commemorated a real horse once owned by the hospital, used to transport laundry and waste. Patients had befriended the animal, which— unlike them— was occasionally permitted to leave the hospital grounds. Standing over three metres tall, the sculpture could only be removed for its unveiling festival by cutting a hole in the hospital’ s perimeter wall, symbolising liberation and the breaking of barriers. The gesture also evoked the legend of the Trojan Horse, but in reverse: whereas the Greeks smuggled soldiers into Troy, Marco Cavallo symbolically carried freedom out of the asylum. This collaboration between doctors and patients challenged prevailing notions of antagonism and remains a powerful emblem of collective agency and transformation.
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Observing Memories ISSUE 9