Regenerating Places outside the Metropolis : a Reading of Three Global Art-Related Processes and Development Trajectories

The aim of the paper is to reflect on the intersection of two relevant phenomena that unfolded in recent decades in all the most industrialized countries and economies—from the United States to Europe and Japan—as the shrinkage of vast urban and rural areas and the increasing role of culture as a driver for economic growth and social development. The attention is focused on the role of art as one of the main engines of territorial regeneration. Three case studies—Verzegnis in Italy, the Seto Islands in Japan, Marfa in the United States—have been selected to open a reflection on the relation between culture, art and regeneration on a global scale. To measure these effects, the research intertwined field explorations, access to primary and secondary texts, an original mapping of the sites and a series of targeted interviews through an extensive questionnaire. The research addresses the role played by art and culture both in the reuse of abandoned buildings and spaces and in the activation, involvement and self-empowerment of the inhabitants. The aim is not the definition of an immediately generalizable model but to reach the first synthesis, identifying general characters and opening future research paths that engage with the theoretical and practical implementation of politics related to heritage, culture and innovative regeneration processes

They must have enjoyed building here : Reyner Banham and Buffalo

"They must have enjoyed building here: Reyner Banham and Buffalo" engages with the intellectual legacy of Reyner Banham, focusing in particular on the Buffalo and Niagara region

Dove è Venezia

Affermare – o chiedersi – dove sia Venezia può apparire banale, o addirittura provocatorio. Eppure, la questione è oggetto dell’interesse e degli studi di specialisti e di figure pubbliche che attorno alla definizione di dove sia Venezia – e di conseguenza di cosa sia Venezia – hanno speso molte parole, redigendo storie, discutendo politiche e producendo visioni per il futuro. L’operazione di riconoscere più Venezie, sia in termini spaziali che temporali, vista la compresenza nell’immaginario collettivo di Venezie sincroniche e diacroniche, è propria di diverse discipline. Se lo è nell’ambito di studi strategici alla scala territoriale e continentale, questa è altrettanto ricorrente in ambito storiografico

Venice: a history of maintenance

Venice maintains an ontological relationship with the waters. Yet, from its origins, it is thanks to a centuries-old history of techniques, ideas, and projects that the fragile, sometimes hostile and insalubrious territory of the Venice lagoon has been turned habitable, combining the reasons of economic development with those of environmental protection. The Venice lagoon is in a perpetual battle against its transitional geographical condition, whose natural destiny would be that of disappearing and become a part of the sea or an extension of the land. For almost fifteen hundred years, in order to oppose this fate, man has changed the course of rivers, drained and reclaimed entire parts of territory, pumped water, consolidated mud, built embankments, canals, bridles, dams and bridges. By its own nature a mutable space, the Venice lagoon is a constant work of maintenance, from the great engineering efforts of the Republic to the micro-interventions of fishermen, millers and farmers that supported the subsistence of its population for centuries

An American Temple : The Empire with Ilaria Forti, Joseph Swerdin, and Barbara Modolo, Verona, Italy

The first nuclear pile, Chicago Pile 1 (CP-1), does not exist anymore. Built as part of the Manhattan Project, the program promoted by the U.S. Government that brought about the development of the first atomic bomb during World War II, CP-1 allowed the initiation of the first man-made, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction. Over its lifetime, the pile was frequently dismantled and rebuilt\u2013counting around 30 different iterations\u2013just as a Japanese temple is, but for different reasons. The proposal to create two full-scale reconstructions of the volume defined by CP-1\u2019s graphite core in the context of the CAB would yield a final iteration of this unique structure

Lo standard come costume

Gli standard urbanistici in vigore rispondono ad un'idea di modernità sfasata rispetto a quella contemporanea.Essi sono il risultato e la conseguenza di secolari battaglie per la salubrità delle abitazioni e dignità degli inquilini. Se si può dire che questi obiettivi siano stati in larga misura raggiunti, sono ora nuove le sfide che la città pone: rigenerazione e riuso, non più espansione e costruzione; inclusione e accessibilità, non più mera soddisfazione dei fabbisogni primari dell'individuo. Gli standard urbanistici dovrebbero essere rivisti guardando più al concetto di costume che a quello di prescrizione. Un'innovativa revisione degli standard dovrà guardare con attenzione alla dimensione del welfare, andando oltre la semplice imposizione del rispetto di coefficienti e pagamento di oneri, rendendo la loro applicazione un naturale riflesso di un sapere stratificato, di rinnovate abitudini sociali, di una condivisa quotidianità. Alcune esperienze recenti ed ancora in corso, come l'istituzione dei NIL (Nuclei di identità locale) nel PGT di Milano, hanno preso le mosse da riflessioni in questa direzione

On paper and black diorite architecture : An intimate view on ten years of San Rocco magazine

Adolfo Natalini\u2019s outlet sounded very familiar: \u201cWe continue to make paper architectures and think of them as made of Elba granite, of black diorite, of gray trachyte. The very few things that we can do are pathetically coated with white ceramic, as children in Limbo." These lines exuded our same ambition, both as editors and, I would add, as architects. The ambition to build something durable, that would last in time and occupy a specific space in the field of our discipline

Of radiating samples, souvenirs and relics

Somewhere in between the cities and monuments that once gave geographic continuity to the governmental program that developed the atomic bomb in the United States, architect and editor Ludovico Centis started a collection. Either found or gifted, these objects quickly become relics, presented in this article with photographs by Alberto Sinigaglia