Italy: Modern Architectures in History

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Description

Throughout the twentieth century, architects in Italy have attempted to define the role of architecture in a capitalist economy and under diverse political systems, from the monarchy of the first seventy years since Italian unification, to the twenty-one years of Fascist control, to the post-World War II parliamentary republic. Italy: Modern Architectures in History provides a fascinating insight into the development of modern architecture, nuanced arguments about architecture and building practices and it offers a new way of understanding the history of modern Italy.

Reviews

Ghirardo's work is distinguished by its breadth and insights. While provocative and partisan, this well-balanced book treats its subject matter with appropriate respect. Specialists in the field will find its historiographic stance a welcome challenge to the conventional reception of Italian modernism, and students will find it a compelling introduction to the richly diverse architectural production of modern Italy. * Journal of Architectural Education *
[a] synthetic, sharp text . . . a modern architectural history of a country sorely in need of self-criticism. * Giornale dell'Architettura *
[Ghirardo] has lived, breathed Italian architecture for decades and is by far one of the most accomplished scholars of architecture in that part of the world, and this book certainly proves it. * Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians *
pushes the discussion to a new level of both inquiry and synthesis. * Architectural Histories *
This book not only updates contemporary architectural history but also opens a new and complex landscape too often silenced elsewhere by redefining the role of Italian architecture within a capitalist economy . . . Diane Ghirardo's book offers a new understanding the architectual history of Italy, providing a fundamental element for a critical historiography. * L'Industria delle Costruzioni magazine *
This excellent history of architecture in Italy from unification to the present takes us on a fascinating journey through space and time, in which the built environment and man's traces on the Italian peninsula reveal the country's history, culture and life. * Francesco da Mosto, architect, historian and television presenter *
This is an important book, which analyses modern Italian architecture in its social, economic and cultural context. Ghirardo's original and thought-provoking volume provides the reader with a wealth of information from housing and civic architecture to unauthorised building and the construction industrys impact on the environment. Highly recommended. * John Foot, Professor of Modern Italian History, UCL and author of Milan Since the Miracle, Italy's Divided Memory and Pedalare! Pedalare! *
One of the intriguing paradoxes of modern architecture is its centrality in the 20th century to Italy, cradle of classicism. In this masterful narrative, presented on the scale of a postwar neo-realist film, Diane Ghirardo documents the creative tensions and achievement of an architecture that first sought to materialize the Fascist future, only to be challenged to rebuild the Italy destroyed by Fascism and thereby restore to the built environment elegance and an ambience of hope and futurity. * Kevin Starr, University of Southern California *

Author Bio

Diane Yvonne Ghirardo is Professor of Architecture at the University of Southern California. She has published widely on Italian architecture.