Readings Uniﬁ Ed Italy and Led to a New Appreciation of Humble of the Great Vernacular Past, Eagerly Mixing the Casual

ian nationalism and the discourse of modernism. problematic were the Futurists, the fi rst truly avant- While the connections of vernacular buildings to garde artists, who in theory despised everything that famous modern architects such as Giovanni suggested a revival of the past but who, out of ahistori- Michelucci and Giancarlo de Carlo are well known, cal pragmatism, admired simple rural structures. In the multifarious precedents and simultaneities the background were the pompous constructions of explored in the book come as a rich surprise. The late offi cial Fascist culture, which infl ated the scale of clas- nineteenth century passion for folk culture served the sical architecture. (Many Italian architects nonetheless mandate to establish a national identity for recently considered classical architecture as a sort of synthesis readings unifi ed Italy and led to a new appreciation of humble of the great vernacular past, eagerly mixing the casual » sources of design and decoration among Italian archi- placement of rural elements with the clear symmetry tects, including Beaux-Arts practitioners such as and volume of temples.) The modernist contingent on Marcello Piacentini. Sabatino carefully examines the the left pursued the idea of modesty but had few com- texts and exhibitions missions. After the fall of Fascism, many of the Italian that cultivated a new modernists, such as Libera and Ignazio Gardella, went PRIDE IN MODESTY understanding of folk on to produce the self-consciously ordinary structures architecture as a source of Neorealism in an effort to use modern techniques Pride in Modesty: Modernist Architecture and the Vernacular Tradition in Italy of inspiration. The while maintaining the scale and social relations of folk (Michelangelo Sabatino, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2010, movement came to a buildings. 336 pp., $72.95) climax during the 1930s The study of regionalism and folk buildings invari- Modern Architecture and the Mediterranean: Vernacular Dialogues and Contested as the modernist contin- ably leads to controversial political interpretations. Identities (Jean-François Lejeune and Michelangelo Sabatino, Oxon: Rout- gent of Italian architects, Recourse to folk traditions or regionalism tends to ledge, 2010, 320 pp., $53.95) under the rubric of accompany the most conservative developments in “rationalism,” argued society. In other European contexts, particularly Ger- by Richard Ingersoll for the undecorated pri- many, the interest in regional types contributed to the mary forms of spontaneous or “rural” buildings. bigotry and racism of the Nazi regime. In colonial The formal results led art critic Lionello Ven- North Africa, it became a means of compensating for turi to coin the expression “pride in the weight of imperial oppression. Many cases contem- modesty” in 1933 to summarize this poraneous to the story told in Sabatino’s book are Spartan return to folk traditions. documented in Modern Architecture and the Mediterra- The sole disappointment in nean, a volume of essays that he and Jean-François Sabatino’s otherwise superb book Lejeune co-edited. Here one fi nds fascinating parallels is its limited attention to the to the Italian interest in folk building. Kai Gutschow formal and theoretical on Paul Schultze-Naumburg’s promotion of Heimat- underpinnings of Casa stil, which based Nazi Germany culture in traditional Malaparte, the rural society, or Sheila Crane on Ferdinand Pouillon’s unquestionable mas- works in Algiers offer particularly astute insights into terpiece related to the political use of the discourse of folk buildings. The these Italian cultural dis- volume also contains Andrea Bocco Guarneri’s illumi- cussions. While he goes on at nating essay on Rudofsky that probes how his contact length about the importance of the with the Mediterranean environment and his collabo- island of Capri as a cauldron of intellectual ration with architects such as Gio Ponti and Luigi activity, following lesser-known characters such as Cosenza at Capri and Naples inaugurated his appre- Edwin Cerio, Sabatino neglects to examine in detail ciation of an “architecture without architects.” In their the folk origins of Casa Malaparte and instead suggests introductory essay, Lejeune and Sabatino claim that its dubious connections to Futurism. The red walls of the simple buildings of the Mediterranean led to the DO IDEAS IN ARCHITECTURE TRICKLE DOWN FROM THE the house rise from the rocky cliffs as a pure parallel- profound refl ections on form by Adolf Loos, Le Cor- genius of elite models and intellectually inspired can- epiped, similar to the unadorned volumes in southern busier, Erich Mendelsohn, and scores of other ons, or do they fi lter up from another type of genius, Italian hill towns. The interior has a single grand infl uential modernists. They also do justice here to the the popular practice of building that adapts to the salon, a rustic but purely modern space, with enor- importance of Casa Malaparte as a manifestation of materials and meteorological conditions of a region? mous picture windows. A kitchen area serves one end, the “neo-Pythagorism” inspired by the vernacular Michelangelo Sabatino in his book Pride in Modesty and a suite of bedrooms for Malaparte and “la favor- structures on the shores of the Mediterranean. takes the latter position, examining the discussions ita” occupy the other, overlooking the sea. But then Rural and anonymous traditions that survive today among Italian architects concerning tradition and again perhaps Casa Malaparte is too eccentric, and too tend to be found in the sad situations of shantytowns. modernity over the last two centuries. His research elitist, to serve as a suitable example. This should remind us that “vernacular” usually makes a strong case that the Italian interest in what As an intellectual history, Sabatino’s book provides meant the architecture of the poor and thus repre- today is referred to as “vernacular architecture” set the a truly original and well-rounded survey of vernacular sented a mode of class confl ict. Sabatino concludes: parameters for its entry into general theoretical discus- architecture in which one can position tangents from “Rather than ignore the vestiges of an agrarian world sions. One need only consider the event that the most conservative to the most radical—from the threatened by dissolution in the wake of industrializa- popularized the concept: Bernard Rudofsky’s Archi- academic culture of Piacentini and Armando Brasini, tion, Italian architects sought new forms of creative tecture without Architects exhibition and catalogue who dipped into folk motifs to instill a sense of deep dialogue with the ordinary things of the city and the at New York’s Museum of Modern Art in 1964, Mediterranean roots to their works, to Giuseppe countryside. In so doing they created an architectural 40 whose ideas were clearly derived from the Austrian Pagano, the leading rationalist spokesperson whose modernity of resistance.” While the historical circum- emigré’s participation in Italian cultural discussions of interest in folk building was for its essentialism, rather stances have greatly changed, and the new criterion of .cite the 1930s. than its iconic signifi ers. Italian architects at both sustainability now has higher priority in the reconsid- Sabatino’s admirable study traces the interest in extremes drew inspiration from the anonymous eration of vernacular buildings, the message of “pride popular buildings as it mingled with the birth of Ital- “rural” structures, as they preferred to call them. More in modesty” still rings true today. FALL2010.

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