Papers by Gianluca Frediani
The Journal of Architecture, 2020
In the theory of architecture, there is probably no more hotly debated and controversial issue th... more In the theory of architecture, there is probably no more hotly debated and controversial issue than the use of the golden section as a tool for governing the proportions of forms and spaces. In this article, the author shows that the work of the Venetian architect Carlo Scarpa has its roots in the classical theory of proportions. He examines two drawings by Scarpa, demonstrating their application of harmonic proportions to the museum space and the close ties between it and the art works on display. Unlike Le Corbusier, perhaps the most important modern master to have used the golden section in his designs, Scarpa employs this proportional system in a pragmatic and experimental way, applying it only in places of special importance. This is true of the “small masterpieces” gallery in the Gallerie dell’Accademia and of the Main Lecture Theatre at IUAV, again in Venice. Scarpa thus reveals two important principles of his work: that small size is an essential premise for attempting perfection and, more generally, that the architectural project is a matter of visual perception based on the quest for the “right proportion”.
Territorio Della Ricerca Su Insediamenti E Ambiente Rivista Internazionale Di Cultura Urbanistica, Dec 30, 2013
Haliç (The Golden Horn) is a mythical place that belongs not only to the history of Istanbul but ... more Haliç (The Golden Horn) is a mythical place that belongs not only to the history of Istanbul but to the whole of Europe. At Haliç land and sea merge: the natural harbour of ancient Constantinople, home to the naval arsenal and place of delights, it saw its natural and urban state change completely in the final phases of the Ottoman Empire. Its recent history has been marked by a process of intense industrialization, developing uncontrollably on its banks between the 19th and 20th centuries. Its importance as a production centre -the country’s most important industrial area – grew in time in parallel with pollution levels in the surrounding environment. The climax of this process of transformation took place in the first decades after World War II when, due to heavy industrial pollution and the saturation of coastal spaces, Haliç became the productive heart but also the most run-down and densely populated urban area of the city. The history of the subsequent redevelopment of Haliç is...
Due capolavori scarpiani riletti alla luce dei documenti di archivio e di una campagna di rilievi... more Due capolavori scarpiani riletti alla luce dei documenti di archivio e di una campagna di rilievi. In essi, il rapporto fra architettura e paesaggio descrive una concezione tutta visuale del progetto, in cui la linea di orizzonte costituisce il movente segreto e il principio ordinatore di una intuizione spaziale che liberamente si muove fra citazioni classiche e l’ammirazione per le culture orientali. New interpretation of two masterpieces of Carlo Scarpa on the basis of archival documents and a survey campaign. The relationship between architecture and landscape underlines Scarpa’s visual approch to design project, where the horizon line is the secret motive and the generating principle of a free spatial intuition referred to classical and oriental models.
Istanbul, modern and contemporary architecture.
Il recupero delle aree ferroviarie e la costruzione della città satellite di Aspern, sottolineano... more Il recupero delle aree ferroviarie e la costruzione della città satellite di Aspern, sottolineano l’aspirazione di Vienna a giocare un ruolo importante sulla scena internazionale, come città globale con una altissima qualità di vita. The renewal of the railway areas and the new satellite district in Aspern emphasize the aspiration of Vienna to play an important role on the international scene as a global city with a high quality of life.
Carlo Scarpa is one of the best-known and most
studied modern architects; the bibliography on his... more Carlo Scarpa is one of the best-known and most
studied modern architects; the bibliography on his
works is vast and exhaustive. Despite the undeniably
positive critical reception of his work, however,
approaching the complex world of his forms is neither
easy nor immediate. The singular nature of
his built spaces and the originality of his famous
construction details have often left him open to
accusations of sterile and self-referential formalism.
This picture of a refined artist isolated in his
ivory tower has long overshadowed his work as an
architect. In fact, Carlo Scarpa was a perceptive
intellectual and an artist sensitive to all aspects of
the contemporary world. In his long career as an
architect, he constantly sought to reinterpret the
legacy of the classical tradition, blending it with the
most stimulating ideas drawn from his great interest
in international artistic experimentation and the
cultures of the Far East.
The poetry of Scarpa’s work springs not only from
the geometrical rigour of his forms but also from
his acute sensitivity towards immaterial aspects of
architecture such as light and colour, the sky and
the horizon. This article contains the preliminary
results of a long study of the original documents in
the architect’s personal archive. It will focus in particular
on the relationship between architecture and
the landscape, developed in a particularly intense
cycle of mature works comprising the extension to
the Canova plaster museum and the monumental
cemetery for the Brion family. In both cases, it
would be hard to describe Scarpa’s works simply
as “buildings”: in them, open spaces and the rapport
with the sky and the landscape are almost as
important as the solid parts of the structure. Scarpa
arranges the various elements of the construction
by orienting them towards the natural landscape in
search of an intimate and creative relationship with
the great artistic tradition of the Veneto. The plaster
museum is a space projected wholly towards the
landscape, inspired by the paintings of Lotto and
Canova’s classical legacy. The Brion cemetery, by
contrast, is a garden-building that blends oriental
influences and Western art to offer a captivating
array of visual experiences created by sculptural
objects and structured spaces. Here Scarpa plays
explicitly with the fine line of the horizon, cutting
the built volume at the exact height of viewers’
eyes, and thus aligning, on the edge of the boundary
wall, objects near and far that resonate with
his architectural forms. The walled space embraces
the changeability of the sky and the light, which
become the true protagonists of the architectural
work, following in the footsteps of an experimentation
that runs from Giorgione to Le Corbusier.
In the plaster museum, the altitude of +1.37 m
marks ground level; in the Brion cemetery, eye level
is set at +1.62 m. Between these two extremes,
Scarpa calibrates his architectural landscapes almost
like optical devices, to see into the distance
Gianluca FREDIANI
On the Line of the Horizon: Architecture Between Earth and Sky.
Carlo Scarpa: the Canova Plaster Museum (1955-1957) and the Brion Cemetery
(1969-1978).
Entlang des Horizonts: Architektur zwischen Himmel und Erde.
Carlo Scarpa: die Gipsothek von Canova (1955-1957) und der Brion Friedhof
(1969 - 1978)
without being seen. The magnificent obsession
with perfect sight” is in him so compelling and
fundamental that it appears to demand a constant
reference point from which to measure the dimensional
variations transcribed into the stratified world
of his forms: the horizon. Scarpa thus shows us
that architecture is the sublime play of materials
arrange above and below the line of the horizon.
Due capolavori scarpiani riletti alla luce dei documenti di archivio e di una campagna di rilievi... more Due capolavori scarpiani riletti alla luce dei documenti di archivio e di una campagna di rilievi. In essi, il rapporto fra architettura e paesaggio descrive una concezione tutta visuale del progetto, in cui la linea di orizzonte costituisce il movente segreto e il principio ordinatore di una intuizione spaziale che liberamente si muove fra citazioni classiche e l’ammirazione per le culture orientali.
Architettura e paesaggio nei lavori "asolani" di Carlo Scarpa
Vienna is different… Strategies for the global city Vista aerea sulla Hauptbahnhof; © ÖBB, Redl A... more Vienna is different… Strategies for the global city Vista aerea sulla Hauptbahnhof; © ÖBB, Redl Aerial view on the Hauptbahnhof; © ÖBB, Redl URBAN DESIGN Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien: vista aerea, © Baan (in alto); la piazza, © Halbe (a sinistra) e lo spazio centrale, © Baan (a destra) Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien: aerial view, © Baan (above); the square, © Halbe (on the left) and central hall, © Baan (on the right) Esterno; © Halbe (in basso) Exterior; © Halbe (below) Renders coperture, piano quinto, piano terzo e piano terra. © Zaha Hadid Renders roof floor, fifth floor, third floor and grond floor. © Zaha Hadid
PAESAGGIO URBANO (www.paesaggiourbano.net), Feb 2011
EXPI Museo scientifico didattico a St. Margareten im Rosental (A)
PAESAGGIO URBANO (www.paesaggiourbano.net), Jun 2013
Journal of Comparative Cultural Studies in Architecture, Jan 6, 2012
The "Sassi", rupestrian settlements built in Matera in the early Middle Ages, were inscribed in t... more The "Sassi", rupestrian settlements built in Matera in the early Middle Ages, were inscribed in the World Heritage List in 1993 and as such are now protected by the UNESCO. Their urban rehabilitation is slowly but gradually proceeding with some positive results already showing. The growing presence of craft businesses and sustainable models of "integrated multi-building accommodation" has revived the old city, getting the population back to the two historical settlements that had been long closed and abandoned. Today, the complex of Byzantine churches and rupestrian coenobies represents an extremely valuable cultural heritage and a major touristic resource for the economy of this problem-ridden area of the Italian South, long steeped in an identity crisis. Hopefully, this is the end of a long phase of oblivion during which the Sassi were denounced as a "national shame" following the repeated social reports on the local community's appalling conditions. The issuing of special laws led to the residents' relocation in new residential districts built in the surroundings. The construction of these new districts, carried out while the dwellings in the old centre were shut down, was the result of complicated political and cultural processes that saw the intervention of several major intellectuals and urban planners in postwar Italy. Therefore, the Sassi's more recent history has been part of Italy's reconstruction between the nineteen-fifties and the sixties when Matera, a small provincial town, became a sort of open-air workshop for modern urban planning. Starting from the study of the spontaneous traditions of collective life in the Sassi and from the results of other international experiences, a social utopia was conceived in those years that pursued the dream of building a new rural civilization in the countryside surrounding the city. The collapse of this communal utopia, otherwise shared by a broad portion of natural culture, has unveiled the Sassi's historical and human reality, and allowed for the rediscovery of a cultural heritage that the moral bias due to the residents' desperate life conditions had all but obliterated. The reading of the Sassi's spatial and urban qualities is complemented by a concise discussion of their historical development, an analysis of the rupestrian settlements' formal and material structure and their relationship with the nature of the environment and the urbanscape. The relationship between nature and construction, the cave dwellings, the system of water collection and, particularly, the organization of collective spaces into "vicinati", are the other issues explored in this text.
PAESAGGIO URBANO (www.paesaggiourbano.net), Jan 2013
PAESAGGIO URBANO , Jun 2009
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Papers by Gianluca Frediani
studied modern architects; the bibliography on his
works is vast and exhaustive. Despite the undeniably
positive critical reception of his work, however,
approaching the complex world of his forms is neither
easy nor immediate. The singular nature of
his built spaces and the originality of his famous
construction details have often left him open to
accusations of sterile and self-referential formalism.
This picture of a refined artist isolated in his
ivory tower has long overshadowed his work as an
architect. In fact, Carlo Scarpa was a perceptive
intellectual and an artist sensitive to all aspects of
the contemporary world. In his long career as an
architect, he constantly sought to reinterpret the
legacy of the classical tradition, blending it with the
most stimulating ideas drawn from his great interest
in international artistic experimentation and the
cultures of the Far East.
The poetry of Scarpa’s work springs not only from
the geometrical rigour of his forms but also from
his acute sensitivity towards immaterial aspects of
architecture such as light and colour, the sky and
the horizon. This article contains the preliminary
results of a long study of the original documents in
the architect’s personal archive. It will focus in particular
on the relationship between architecture and
the landscape, developed in a particularly intense
cycle of mature works comprising the extension to
the Canova plaster museum and the monumental
cemetery for the Brion family. In both cases, it
would be hard to describe Scarpa’s works simply
as “buildings”: in them, open spaces and the rapport
with the sky and the landscape are almost as
important as the solid parts of the structure. Scarpa
arranges the various elements of the construction
by orienting them towards the natural landscape in
search of an intimate and creative relationship with
the great artistic tradition of the Veneto. The plaster
museum is a space projected wholly towards the
landscape, inspired by the paintings of Lotto and
Canova’s classical legacy. The Brion cemetery, by
contrast, is a garden-building that blends oriental
influences and Western art to offer a captivating
array of visual experiences created by sculptural
objects and structured spaces. Here Scarpa plays
explicitly with the fine line of the horizon, cutting
the built volume at the exact height of viewers’
eyes, and thus aligning, on the edge of the boundary
wall, objects near and far that resonate with
his architectural forms. The walled space embraces
the changeability of the sky and the light, which
become the true protagonists of the architectural
work, following in the footsteps of an experimentation
that runs from Giorgione to Le Corbusier.
In the plaster museum, the altitude of +1.37 m
marks ground level; in the Brion cemetery, eye level
is set at +1.62 m. Between these two extremes,
Scarpa calibrates his architectural landscapes almost
like optical devices, to see into the distance
Gianluca FREDIANI
On the Line of the Horizon: Architecture Between Earth and Sky.
Carlo Scarpa: the Canova Plaster Museum (1955-1957) and the Brion Cemetery
(1969-1978).
Entlang des Horizonts: Architektur zwischen Himmel und Erde.
Carlo Scarpa: die Gipsothek von Canova (1955-1957) und der Brion Friedhof
(1969 - 1978)
without being seen. The magnificent obsession
with perfect sight” is in him so compelling and
fundamental that it appears to demand a constant
reference point from which to measure the dimensional
variations transcribed into the stratified world
of his forms: the horizon. Scarpa thus shows us
that architecture is the sublime play of materials
arrange above and below the line of the horizon.
studied modern architects; the bibliography on his
works is vast and exhaustive. Despite the undeniably
positive critical reception of his work, however,
approaching the complex world of his forms is neither
easy nor immediate. The singular nature of
his built spaces and the originality of his famous
construction details have often left him open to
accusations of sterile and self-referential formalism.
This picture of a refined artist isolated in his
ivory tower has long overshadowed his work as an
architect. In fact, Carlo Scarpa was a perceptive
intellectual and an artist sensitive to all aspects of
the contemporary world. In his long career as an
architect, he constantly sought to reinterpret the
legacy of the classical tradition, blending it with the
most stimulating ideas drawn from his great interest
in international artistic experimentation and the
cultures of the Far East.
The poetry of Scarpa’s work springs not only from
the geometrical rigour of his forms but also from
his acute sensitivity towards immaterial aspects of
architecture such as light and colour, the sky and
the horizon. This article contains the preliminary
results of a long study of the original documents in
the architect’s personal archive. It will focus in particular
on the relationship between architecture and
the landscape, developed in a particularly intense
cycle of mature works comprising the extension to
the Canova plaster museum and the monumental
cemetery for the Brion family. In both cases, it
would be hard to describe Scarpa’s works simply
as “buildings”: in them, open spaces and the rapport
with the sky and the landscape are almost as
important as the solid parts of the structure. Scarpa
arranges the various elements of the construction
by orienting them towards the natural landscape in
search of an intimate and creative relationship with
the great artistic tradition of the Veneto. The plaster
museum is a space projected wholly towards the
landscape, inspired by the paintings of Lotto and
Canova’s classical legacy. The Brion cemetery, by
contrast, is a garden-building that blends oriental
influences and Western art to offer a captivating
array of visual experiences created by sculptural
objects and structured spaces. Here Scarpa plays
explicitly with the fine line of the horizon, cutting
the built volume at the exact height of viewers’
eyes, and thus aligning, on the edge of the boundary
wall, objects near and far that resonate with
his architectural forms. The walled space embraces
the changeability of the sky and the light, which
become the true protagonists of the architectural
work, following in the footsteps of an experimentation
that runs from Giorgione to Le Corbusier.
In the plaster museum, the altitude of +1.37 m
marks ground level; in the Brion cemetery, eye level
is set at +1.62 m. Between these two extremes,
Scarpa calibrates his architectural landscapes almost
like optical devices, to see into the distance
Gianluca FREDIANI
On the Line of the Horizon: Architecture Between Earth and Sky.
Carlo Scarpa: the Canova Plaster Museum (1955-1957) and the Brion Cemetery
(1969-1978).
Entlang des Horizonts: Architektur zwischen Himmel und Erde.
Carlo Scarpa: die Gipsothek von Canova (1955-1957) und der Brion Friedhof
(1969 - 1978)
without being seen. The magnificent obsession
with perfect sight” is in him so compelling and
fundamental that it appears to demand a constant
reference point from which to measure the dimensional
variations transcribed into the stratified world
of his forms: the horizon. Scarpa thus shows us
that architecture is the sublime play of materials
arrange above and below the line of the horizon.