giovedì 20 gennaio 2011

Fascist architecture


Although most architects coming from the school of the University of Rome are thrown into ecstasis when considering italian architecture of the fascist period, in particular the important examples of Rome, I personally believe this architecture to be rather horrible. Of course, the fascist regime contracted only excellent architects, the rationalism of Libera and Michelucci was very "modern" with respect to the current architecture of the time, but buildings such as the Palazzo delle Poste in via Marmorata and Ostia, although quite nice, sounds to me rather false. The main problem is size: the moderately large buildings of Latina and Sabaudia, although somewhat rethoric, retain reasonable proportions and are quite tolerable; the huge buildings of Rome put everything out of scale. In particular, the immense Morpurgo's Palazzo della Farnesina is a perfect representation of the illusory ambitions of the regime: a secondary power, with few colonies, a stunted economy and inconsistent army, with the ambition to compete with countries such as England or the United States; the Palazzo della Farnesina seems a puppy dog barking at a big mastiff. Morevoer, such enormous proportions are completely unfunctional: the exact opposite of true rationalism, and something that reminds instead the pompous architecture of late XIX century ("architettura umbertina"); fascist architecture is fundamentally the provincial umbertine architecture in the squared cloths of European rationalism - exactly as the fascist regime was a conservative provincial regime boasting to be revolutionary.

Nessun commento: