Aulenti: Being an architect in the era of globalization

Transcription

1 Aulenti: Being an architect in the era of globalization ARTS&CRAFTS edited by Sasa Carpaneda There is a dichotomy between globalisation and regionalism. The views of one of Italy s greatest architects go against the trend: emphasising the risks deriving from the loss of national identities and warning against the temptation to demolish rather than enhance existing buildings, she explains that the renovation of urban spaces should be based on serious planning by public administrations. H ers is one of the most authoritative pencils of Italian and international architecture. Her experience is vast and varied: from a stint with Casabella, one of the magazines that dictate architecture in Italy, to lectureships at Venice University and the Milan Polytechnic; from designing or renovating houses, villas, entire districts, museums, offices, factories and airports to the study of urban planning; from inventing interior design solutions to exhibition installations and from industrial design to theatre sets. Renowned and appreciated the world over, Gae Aulenti has worked in Paris, Barcelona, Seville, Geneva, Amsterdam, Berlin, Istanbul, Jerusalem, New York, San Francisco, Buenos Aires and Tokyo besides Italy, to name only a few places. Meeting Gae Aulenti in her studio near the Brera district in Milan, one gets the impression of a shy person with a strong sense of intellectual discipline who combines the artist s sparkle and sensitivity with a profound sense of reality, and who describes herself quite simply as an architect. This is a time of great transformations, with many cities going through major facelifts. The number of urban renovation projects is multiplying, with extremely large-scale and complex measures being undertaken. The risk, however, is that of creating poles that do not fit into the existing context. What are your feelings on this? This century although the trend had already begun in the 1990s is producing architecture where looks rather than substance (or, to use the technical term, foundation ) are the driving force. This can be attributed to an increasingly fragmented culture. In fact, while globalisation allows for the most varied expressions on the one hand, on the other it uproots them from philosophical ideas that are more directly linked to the territory and the nation, tearing and mixing everything into one large heap. One typical example in this sense is Shanghai, where the city that is taking shape on the other side of the river has nothing eastern about it: the buildings are merely copies of edifices that have already been built in America, although we must not forget that in China, the need to create cities for millions of inhabitants probably compels a lack of research and the same international architects who are called on to work in the country create models that end up losing themselves 34

2 Grazia Neri_ Titti Fabi / Team

3 AULENTI: BEING AN ARCHITECT IN THE ERA OF GLOBALIZATION in the global whole. The West is different: here, on the other hand, we create new models overflowing with seduction and shape that are however equally disconnected from the urban and cultural context. I am referring very clearly to Frank Gehry, the most internationalist architect, and his Guggenheim in Bilbao in the most nationalist region of Spain, or Rem Koolhaas, for whom image and communication count more than the essence of architecture, i.e. creating urban spaces. So what should be the relationship between globalisation and regionalism in contemporary architecture, in your opinion? Globalisation responds to the unconscious desire to make the planet a single one, but carries with it the risk an extremely strong one, in my opinion of losing individual regional identities, not to mention the loss of differences. Taking differences into account is precisely the only way to ensure that a concept is developed. Just think of all the airports we transit through: they are so alike that it is impossible to recognise the city we are in. And this leads to people totally losing their sense of direction, which I think is negative. I believe on the contrary that we should not detach ourselves from the context of a city: this obviously does not mean working in the existing style; rather, it simply means working with a view to continuity. Looking specifically at Eastern Europe, which is now one big building site as a result of a particularly intense phase of development, what are the main trends to be emphasised? Are we seeing the emergence in these countries of architecture schools and professionals _Below, some of Gae Aulenti s best-known projects: the Musée d Orsay in Paris, the renovation of the Palazzo Grassi in Venice and the renovation of the new Asian Art Museum in San Francisco Corbis

4 ARTS&CRAFTS who can finally give free rein to their creativity with individualistic concepts? In the 20th century, Eastern Europe gave rise to an extremely strong school of architecture, Constructivism, which has also spread to the rest of the Western world. This tradition breaks with Moscow s large Stalinist skyscrapers; today Eastern Europe is working towards recovering an identity. There are some excellent architects who are trying with difficulty (not least because, in unifying the various States into a single bloc, the Soviet Union had cancelled the specific characteristics of each) to retrieve the traditions of their own countries, despite working on the contemporary scene. Besides, to quote the poet T.S. Eliot, whose work I am very fond of: Tradition cannot be inherited, and if you want it you must obtain it by great labour. Faced with some horrors in Eastern Europe as well as at home is it worth it to make a clean sweep of things, or is it better to retrieve them anyway and enhance their image in a new context? I believe we should never throw anything away. There is an emblematic example that is very much in the news these days. When Jewish settlers in the Gaza strip are evacuated, the authorities bombard buildings, raze them to the ground and create a field of rubble. But the Palestinians settlers will also need housing. This is a waste that does not take the poverty of the world into account; what s worse, the heaps of rubble are extremely difficult to restore. In terms of the architect s relationship with public administrations and financiers, what do you recall as your best and worst experiences? Every country has its own set of rules. I ve just finished working on a museum in San Francisco; it is owned by the town hall, but the Friends of the Museum paid for the renovation. In the U.S. it is easy to get the public and private sector to work together, Grazia Neri Kaz Tsuruta/Asian Art Museum, San Francisco

5 AULENTI: BEING AN ARCHITECT IN THE ERA OF GLOBALIZATION Olycom transparently and with clear objectives, because the project is studied only after the economic and financial plans have been drawn up on the basis of pre-determined costs and limits. This is unlike Italy where, on the other hand, it is very difficult to know budget limits in advance, and customers especially those in the public sector do not as a rule appear to be interested in ensuring the continuity and completion of the job. Just look at how many tenders in Italy are stopped, with the project already assigned, when the administration changes, despite the money that has already been spent taxpayers money at that. I had a particularly negative experience with the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, where after having won the tender, drawn up the final project and worked on it for eight months the site was closed down because the runnerup filed a case with the regional administrative court. The Museum of Catalan Art in Barcelona was the opposite. It s a huge museum in an existing building, which we finished in 2004 after 18 years of work. The project took a long time to complete because the necessary funds were lacking, so we did an overall project divided into phases that were completed as and when funds arrived. They key to success was serious planning and _An example of seductive architecture that is totally detached from its cultural context: the famous Guggenheim built in Bilbao, Spain, by internationalist architect Frank Gehry a coherent approach on the part of the government officials responsible, who continued to believe in the project despite the original official being successively replaced by others. Speaking of museums, you have renovated many buildings over the last 25 years. What were the inspiring concepts that have guided you in creating places that allow access to a larger public and make for better enjoyment of the works of art? Specifically, how do you make use of light in your projects? There has never been a single inspiring theme. It all depends on the city in which the museum is located, the building in which it is situated and the collection it contains. These are the three elements that lead to the birth of any given project and define the differences between one museum and another. The Musée d Orsay experience was fundamental for me; I was lucky enough to work with Michel Laclotte, then curator of 38

6 ARTS&CRAFTS Olycom _The dome of the German Parliament in Berlin, a symbol of ecotech architecture by Norman Foster, who also designed the Commerzbank tower in Frankfurt along the same lines the Louvre, who taught me a great deal. I am one of those professionals for whom architecture must follow and enhance the collection: hence the search for the most varied spaces for many works or, on the contrary, for a single work, with a view to constant contrasts. As for light, it is fundamental because it enhances the visitor s enjoyment of the works of art. Hence the need for an accurate study to optimise the ratio of natural and artificial light, avoid the formation of shadows and the entry of direct sunlight and control the intensity and the source of light. There is a lot of talk of ecotech architecture, symbolised by the Commerzbank in Frankfurt and the dome of the German Parliament in Berlin, both Norman Foster s projects. It seems to me that are still problems of a technical nature to resolve. What do you think? The problem is that we have no alternative: it is absolutely necessary to find other ways to source energy, even if the costs, of solar panels for example, are obviously higher than those of traditional energy. In fact we used solar energy to build a school, inaugurated two years ago, in Villar Perosa. This is a public building, although the Agnelli family financed the work. The choice of alternative energy was intended to set an example to the students and shared by the financiers as well as the town hall. In your lengthy experience and travels around the world, which architect has most astonished or fascinated you? Definitely Louis Kahn, a great American architect (of Estonian origin, editor s note) who has also worked in Bangladesh, and always with very strong and precise architecture. In my opinion quality in architecture also means designing buildings that appear to have always been in that place and will always remain there. And this is the case of Kahn s works: they give the impression of continuity; they never seem ephemeral. If you could choose where to work, with no budget limits or administrative obstacles, which cities would you focus on and what would you build? 39

7 AULENTI: BEING AN ARCHITECT IN THE ERA OF GLOBALIZATION An architect cannot and must not dream of the impossible. But if that were the case, one of my passions is the city of Bangalore, in India. It is a place with great traditions that has managed to become a leader in technological research. Perhaps I would design a portion of that city. What projects are you currently working on? Having renovated the Palavela in Turin and completed the Palazzo del ghiaccio (Ice Palace) for the figure skating and short-track competitions at the Winter Olympics, I am now working among other things on a new industrial complex for the production of thermal and electrical energy from renewable sources and natural gas in Coriano, Rimini, _Right: a photo of Bangalore, India, a place with great traditions that has now also become a leader in technological research Gae Aulenti Having graduated from the Milan Polytechnic in 1953, from 1955 to 1965 Gae Aulenti worked on the editorial team of Casabella-Continuità, edited by Ernesto Nathan Rogers. Since 1956 she has worked as an architect with a studio in Milan on projects ranging from architectural design, urban planning, interiors and industrial design, exhibition installations and theatre sets. She was a lecturer at the Architectural Institute of Venice (from 1960 to 1962), the architecture faculty at the Milan Polytechnic (from 1964 to 1969) and the Prato Theatre Design Workshop (from 1976 to 1978). She has also been a member of various international juries for architectural and urban planning competitions and spoken at seminars and conferences worldwide. She was Dean of the Brera Academy of Fine Arts in Milan from 1995 to In January 2005 she set up Gae Aulenti Architetti Associati. Some of her best-known work includes the Museé d Orsay in Paris ( ) and the new installation for the Musée National d Art Moderne at the Pompidou Centre ( ); she was in charge of renovating Palazzo Grassi in Venice ( ) and subsequently handled the installation of several temporary exhibitions there, from Futurismo & Futurismi (Futurism and Futurisms) in 1986 to Da Puvis de Chavannes a Matisse e Picasso. Verso l Arte Moderna (From Puvis de Chavannes to Matisse and Picasso: Towards Modern Art) in She also won the tender to convert the former Italian embassy in Berlin into the Academy of Science ( ), designed the Italian Hall at the 1992 Seville Expo, created the new entry to the Santa Maria Novella railway station in Florence (1990), planned the renovation of the Government Building of the Republic of San Marino ( ) and won the tender (1997) to rebuild the Teatro La Fenice in Venice together with Italian company Impregilo (the tender was subsequently stopped after eight months of work). Gae Aulenti has additionally overseen the redesigning of the Piazzale Cadorna in Milan (2000); in Naples she redesigned the Museo and Dante underground stations as well as Piazza Cavour and Piazza Dante ( ), and has carried out numerous town planning and landscaping projects for various Italian municipalities. Her architectural projects have won her tenders to design a new home for the Asian

8 ARTS&CRAFTS and the enlargement of a thermal plant using solid urban waste in Forlì as well as the renovation of the Edoardo Chiassone Civic Museum of Oriental Art in Genoa and a project to enlarge Perugia s little airport. Factories and airports in particular are new challenges for me, because I have never done any. You have already won all the top professional awards: what is your objective for the future? To continue to work calmly as long as my brain allows me to and constantly seek new stimuli. Corbis Grazia Neri _Left: Louis Kahn, the great American architect of Estonian origin who has also worked in Bangladesh and whose work communicates a feeling of continuity Art Museum in San Francisco (in association with the HOK/LDA/RWA San Francisco joint venture) the museum opened to the public in March 2003; the former Papal Stables at the Quirinale in Rome, the new location for temporary exhibitions inaugurated in 1999; the Royal Palace of Venaria Reale in Turin; the National Museum of Catalan Art in Barcelona, completed in December 2004 after 18 years of work with the inauguration of the section dedicated to 20th century art and the Edoardo Chiassone Civic Museum of Oriental Art in Genoa (work in progress). The headquarters of the chancellery of the Italian Embassy and the Italian Cultural Institute in Tokyo were inaugurated in 2005 along with the Turin Palavela complex where the figure skating and short-track competitions will be held during the 2006 Winter Olympics. Gae Aulenti s recent installation projects include exhibitions such as : Theater of Italian Creativity in New York (2003); Bilbao a Genova (The Bilbao in Genoa) (2003) and Arti &Architettura (Art &Architecture ) (2004) at the Palazzo Ducale in Genoa; Giorgio De Chirico. Gladiatori (Giorgio De Chirico. Gladiators ) at the Villa Menafoglio Litta Panza in Biumo-Varese (2003); the new visitor s circuit at the Castello Estense in Ferrara, conceived as a story that traces the history of the castle and inaugurated in 2004 with two exhibitions, Una corte nel Rinascimento (A Renaissance Court) and Il Camerino di alabastro Antonio Lombardo e la scultura all antica (The Alabaster Room Antonio Lombardo and old-fashioned sculpture). Many of Gae Aulenti s industrial design creations are famous: from her lamps for Artemide, Fontana Arte, Martinelli Luce and IGuzzini to furniture for Kartell, Knoll, Poltrona Frau, Zanotta; from vases for Venini to accessories for Louis Vuitton; from kitchens for Snaidero to urban furnishings for JCDecaux. Gae Aulenti has received numerous prizes and honours in the course of her career, including the Chevalier de la Legion d Honneur (Paris, 1987); honorary membership of the American Institute of Architects - Hon. FAIA (1990); the Praemium Imperial for architecture (Tokyo, 1991), the Cavaliere di Gran Croce al Merito della Repubblica Italiana (Rome, 1995) and an honorary degree in fine arts from the Rhode Island School of Design (Providence, U.S.A., 2001).