DOCSLIB.ORG

Thinking Through Antinomies: an Enquiry Into Manfredo Tafuri's Historical Method Luisa Lorenza Corna

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Thinking Through Antinomies: an Enquiry Into Manfredo Tafuri's Historical Method Luisa Lorenza Corna Thinking Through Antinomies: An Enquiry into Manfredo Tafuri's Historical Method Luisa Lorenza Corna Submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Leeds School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies May 2016 1 The candidate confirms that the work submitted is her own and that appropriate credit has been given where reference has been made to the work of others. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. © 2016 The University of Leeds and Luisa Lorenza Corna The right of Luisa Lorenza Corna to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. 2 Acknowledgements Many people have enriched my project and thinking immeasurably during the course of my research. My first and deepest thanks goes to my supervisors Gail Day and Richard Checketts. Whereas Gail Day's presence was essential not to lose sight of the general frame of the project, Richard Checketts encouraged me to look closely at details, and turn them into new lines of enquiry. The first part of the title 'Thinking Through Antinomies' could be also considered a metaphor of the process of supervision I underwent. There are a number of people whose help has been essential in the last phase of my thesis. Amongst those, I want to thank Fiona Allen, David Broder, Matthew Hyland and Matteo Cavalleri. 3 Abstract: The following thesis addresses Manfredo Tafuri's historical and critical method. It considers a selection of studies conducted by the Italian historian at different moments of his intellectual trajectory, and it scrutinizes how his unorthodox approach succeeded in challenging established architectural accounts and in exposing the ideologically constructed figure of the architect. The thesis takes its points of departure from Fredric Jameson's interpretation of Tafuri and Francesco Dal Co's book Modern Architecture as a story of sequential failed attempts to resolve the contradiction between the city and the building (or more abstractly, between totality and individual work). Expanding on Jameson's reading, it illustrates how, in the selection of works considered, Tafuri organises his narrative around pairs of (apparently) antinomic terms such as plan and Plan, image and fragment, rule and licence, reality and utopia. Central to the thesis is also the charting of the theoretical and political encounters that shaped Tafuri's mode of thinking. Chapter One focuses on Tafuri and Italian Workerism. It investigates how the Frankfurt School-inflected critique of planning initiated by the founder of Workerism Raniero Panzieri inspired Tafuri's own reading of urban planning. It also looks at the way Tafuri extended the critique of intellectual labour advanced within the frame of the Italian Marxist journal Contropiano to the domain of architecture. Chapter Two tackles Tafuri's analysis of the use of fragment and fragmentation in the work of the Venetian etcher Giambattista Piranesi and in that of the 20th-century avant-garde. It contends that Tafuri's exploration of the meaning of the fragment in works dating from different historical moments is intended to reveal the effect of capitalist development on the communicative potential of form. Chapter Three takes its lead from the 1977 text 'The Historical "Project"', in which Tafuri establishes a set of guidelines for the historical research which will inform his study of Renaissance architecture in the following years. It scrutinizes how the application of this method allows Tafuri to challenge established historical accounts of the Renaissance such as that of Rudolf Wittkower. Finally, Chapter Four returns to Tafuri's earliest 4 interventions in the post-war Italian architectural debate. Whereas the first part considers journal articles on the question of the replanning of Rome, the second focuses on a selection of texts addressing the discussion over the new urban scale and architectural neo-realism. 5 Table of Contents: Acknowledgements.......................................................................................................2 Abstract.........................................................................................................................3 Table of Contents..........................................................................................................5 Introduction.................................................................................................................7 Chapter One: Tafuri's Double Plan................................................................................................ 18 1. The Avant-Garde as a Partial Utopia of the Plan 2. Tafuri in Context 2.1. The Italian Politics of Planning and Its Critique 3. Tafuri's Plan and Workerism. 3.1. Eyeing the Future as Present. Tafuri and Antonio Negri 3.2. Soviet Planning and Ideology. Tafuri and Mario Tronti 3.3. The Autonomy of the Plan 3.4. Planning as a Moment of Capitalist Development. Tafuri and Raniero Panzieri Chapter Two: A Whole Made of Fragments...................................................................................72 1. Introduction 2. Fragment as Critical Tool: Tafuri on Piranesi 2.1. Criticism of the Image of the Past Formed in the Present 2.2. Criticism of the Present 2.3. Criticism of the Future 3. The Relative Value of Fragment, from Piranesi to the Avant-Garde 4. 'Ceci n'est pas un fragment'. From Negative Utopia to Heterotopia Chapter Three: 'The Historical "Project"' in Theory and Practice..............................................114 6 1. From the 'Space of Conflict' to 'The Historical "Project'" 2. 'The Historical "Project"' and its Sources 3. 'The Historical "Project"' in Practice: 3.1. Constructing Another Renaissance: Methodological Premises 3. 1. 1. Contra Wittkower and Analogy 3. 1. 2. Philology as a New Philosophy: The Influence of Eugenio Garin 3. 1. 3. A Rather Functionalist Notion of Language 3. 1. 4. The Unattainability of the Past 3. 1. 5. The Question of Representation 3.2. Alberti, or 'the Weak Power of Concinnitas' 3.3. San Francesco della Vigna and Venice: Refusing Modernity 3.3.1. Venice between Inventio and Consuetudo 3.3.2. The Church of San Francesco Della Vigna Chapter Four: The Formative Years. Architectural Practice and Political Verification..........168 1. The Struggle for the Rome Plan 2. The City-Territory Proposal 4. Realism and the Question of Method 5. From Neorealism to Realism Conclusion...............................................................................................................206 Bibliography............................................................................................................218 7 Introduction The more we perceive problems as worldwide and intergalactic, the more the fear of the world demands a retreat into details, a retreat resembling that of architects. Manfredo Tafuri, 'For a Historical History'1 The peculiar difficulty of dialectical writing lies indeed in its holistic, 'totalizing' character: as though you could not say any one thing until you had first said everything; as though with each new idea you were bound to recapitulate the entire system. Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form2 In an academic setting where thematic approaches prevail, a monographic thesis on an architectural historian may seem a strange endeavour. The risk of appearing 'hagiographic' obliges the writer to ponder every endorsement, keeping a critical attitude constantly alert. In writing this thesis I have tried to maintain such an attitude without being led astray by the writing process itself. Nor does my subject, the work of the architectural historian Manfredo Tafuri, invite celebratory tones or over- familiarity. To approach Tafuri's writing in search of models for thought or action would have meant betraying one of the keystones of his own method: 'implicated though it may be in the objects and phenomena it analyzes', he writes 'historical 1 Manfredo Tafuri, 'For a Historical History (1994)', Casabella, 619-620 (1995), 144-152 (p. 151). Amended translation. 2 Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form. Twentieth-Century Dialectical Theories of Literature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1971), p. 306. 8 criticism must know how to balance on the razor's edge that separates detachment and participation'.3 It must be clarified here that the ultimate subject of this thesis is not, as misleadingly suggested above, the oeuvre of Manfredo Tafuri as such. The exclusion of certain important texts and the disregard for chronological order make it apparent from the outset that no comprehensive intellectual biography is intended here. Rather, this thesis focuses on Tafuri's historical-critical method, and explores how its employment succeeded in undermining established historical narratives and in exposing the ideological veil covering the figure of the architect. The thesis considers both the texts belonging to Tafuri's most openly militant phase, and the ones where political aspects appear less prominently. In so doing, it intends to show that the guiding principle of Tafuri's methodological approach remained largely unchanged, regardless of the variety of themes and historical periods that he tackled. At various points in this thesis I will express my disagreement with regard to Tafuri's positions, and by means of a contextual reading I will show that what could be taken
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Falda's Map As a Work Of
    The Art Bulletin ISSN: 0004-3079 (Print) 1559-6478 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rcab20 Falda’s Map as a Work of Art Sarah McPhee To cite this article: Sarah McPhee (2019) Falda’s Map as a Work of Art, The Art Bulletin, 101:2, 7-28, DOI: 10.1080/00043079.2019.1527632 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00043079.2019.1527632 Published online: 20 May 2019. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 79 View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rcab20 Falda’s Map as a Work of Art sarah mcphee In The Anatomy of Melancholy, first published in the 1620s, the Oxford don Robert Burton remarks on the pleasure of maps: Methinks it would please any man to look upon a geographical map, . to behold, as it were, all the remote provinces, towns, cities of the world, and never to go forth of the limits of his study, to measure by the scale and compass their extent, distance, examine their site. .1 In the seventeenth century large and elaborate ornamental maps adorned the walls of country houses, princely galleries, and scholars’ studies. Burton’s words invoke the gallery of maps Pope Alexander VII assembled in Castel Gandolfo outside Rome in 1665 and animate Sutton Nicholls’s ink-and-wash drawing of Samuel Pepys’s library in London in 1693 (Fig. 1).2 There, in a room lined with bookcases and portraits, a map stands out, mounted on canvas and sus- pended from two cords; it is Giovanni Battista Falda’s view of Rome, published in 1676.
    [Show full text]
  • Palermo, City of Syncretism: Recovering a Complex
    Proceedings of the 3r International Conference on Best Practices in World Heritage: Integral Actions Menorca, Spain, 2-5 May 2018 PALERMO, CITY OF SYNCRETISM: RECOVERING A COMPLEX HISTORIC CENTRE HELPED BY AN AWARE LOCAL COMMUNITY Palermo, ciudad sincrética: recuperar un centro histórico complejo con la ayuda de una comunidad local consciente Giorgio Faraci (1) (1) Università degli Studi di Palermo - DARCH Dipartimento di Architettura, Palermo, Italia, [email protected] ABSTRACT The Italian site of Arab-Norman Palermo and the Cathedral Churches of Cefalú and Monreale was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2015 as an example of a social- cultural syncretism between Western, Islamic and Byzantine cultures. Palermo has maintained its identity over the centuries as a complex and multicultural site. In 1993 the local government of Palermo, supported by the Sicilian Region with specific Laws and funds, launched a process of regeneration of the historic centre, restoring public monuments as well as encouraging recovery of private houses. A specific planning instrument such as the Piano Particolareggiato Esecutivo (PPE) was implemented and a special office was established to coordinate activities and funding. Local community developed a pro-active attitude over the years, demanding local government to promote more cooperation and coordination between the different stakeholders involved in the recovery process. The civil society emphasised the need to intervene not only on the urban and building fabric but also on the social one, starting from the weakest sections of the population. The support of civil society, with its bottom up approach, and the strong political will of local government, determined in the regeneration of the historic centre, made possible to speed up the process.
    [Show full text]
  • PDF Download
    OPEN ACCESS CC BY 4.0 ©The Authors. The contents of this volume are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA. This license allows for copying and adapting any part of the work for personal and commercial use, providing appropriate credit is clearly stated. ISSN: 2532-3512 How to cite this volume: Please use AJPA as abbreviation and ‘Archeostorie. Journal of Public Archaeology’ as full title. Published by: Center for Public Archaeology Studies ‘Archeostorie’ - cultural association via Enrico Toti 14, 57128 Livorno (ITALY) / [email protected] First published 2018. Archeostorie. Journal of Public Archaeology is registered with the Court of Livorno no. 2/2017 of January 24, 2017. ARCHEOSTORIE TM VOLUME 2 / 2018 www.archeostoriejpa.eu Editor in chief Cinzia Dal Maso - Center for Public Archaeology Studies ‘Archeostorie’ Luca Peyronel - University of Milan Advisory board Chiara Bonacchi - University of Stirling Luca Bondioli - Luigi Pigorini National Museum of Prehistory and Ethnography, Rome Giorgio Buccellati - University of California at Los Angeles Aldo Di Russo - Unicity, Rome Dora Galanis - Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports Filippo Maria Gambari - Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage Peter Gould - University of Pennsylvania and The American University of Rome Christian Greco - Egyptian Museum, Turin Richard
    [Show full text]
  • Rome's Landscape Overall Conclusions
    Please note: This is a >>preview How only,to showing a limited number of pages. The full 324 page document is available in the log-in area of the LE:NOTRE Institute web site. How to become a LE:NOTRE Institute Supporter LE:NOTRE Landscape Forum 2013 Rome Table of contents Introduction to the Rome Forum: Richard Stiles , Fabio Di Carlo Part 1: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE LANDSCAPE OF ROME Images from Rome Acknowledgements and Introduction to Part 1. .............................13 Fabio Di Carlo Chapter 1 Trends in contemporary landscape architecture in Rome…………….……........................19 Mirella Di Giovine Chapter 2 Archaeology as a variable component of the image and the town-planning of Rome. ................................................................31 Carlo Pavolini, Massimo de Vico Fallani Chapter 3 Roman landscapes and selected Portraits.......................................................................35 PhD students: Viola Albino, Maria Beatrice Andreucci (co-ordinator), Filippo Calcerano, Sonja Radovic-Jelovac Chapter4 Environment, ecology and natural structure.................................................................. 51 Romeo Di Pietro, with PhD students: Maria Luigia Fiorentino (co-ordinator), Manuela Crespi, Sandra Persiani, Davide Ventura Chapter 5 Configuration and transformations of the urban landscape in Rome............................71 PhD students: Michele Conteduca (co-ordinator), Francesco Antinori, Elnaz Behnam Kia, Dorina Pllumbi Chapter 6 The Regional Context.........................................................................................................91
    [Show full text]
  • Renaissance Art and Architecture
    Renaissance Art and Architecture from the libraries of Professor Craig Hugh Smyth late Director of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University; Director, I Tatti, Florence; Ph.D., Princeton University & Professor Robert Munman Associate Professor Emeritus of the University of Illinois; Ph.D., Harvard University 2552 titles in circa 3000 physical volumes Craig Hugh Smyth Craig Hugh Smyth, 91, Dies; Renaissance Art Historian By ROJA HEYDARPOUR Published: January 1, 2007 Craig Hugh Smyth, an art historian who drew attention to the importance of conservation and the recovery of purloined art and cultural objects, died on Dec. 22 in Englewood, N.J. He was 91 and lived in Cresskill, N.J. The New York Times, 1964 Craig Hugh Smyth The cause was a heart attack, his daughter, Alexandra, said. Mr. Smyth led the first academic program in conservation in the United States in 1960 as the director of the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. Long before he began his academic career, he worked in the recovery of stolen art. After the defeat of Germany in World War II, Mr. Smyth was made director of the Munich Central Collecting Point, set up by the Allies for works that they retrieved. There, he received art and cultural relics confiscated by the Nazis, cared for them and tried to return them to their owners or their countries of origin. He served as a lieutenant in the United States Naval Reserve during the war, and the art job was part of his military service. Upon returning from Germany in 1946, he lectured at the Frick Collection and, in 1949, was awarded a Fulbright research fellowship, which took him to Florence, Italy.
    [Show full text]
  • Loughlin Kealy School of Architecture, University College of Dublin (Ireland)
    Teaching Conservation/Restoration of the Architectural Heritage Goals, Contents and Methods This project has been carried out with the support of the European Community and in the framework of the Socrates Programme. The content of this project does not necessarily reflect the position of the European Community, nor does it involve any responsibility on the part of the European Community. Host Institution School of Specialization in Restoration of Monuments University of Genoa Faculty of Architecture University of Genoa DSA – Department of Sciences for Architecture University of Genoa Institutions that gave their patronage to the workshop Regional Directorate of Liguria for Cultural Heritage and Landscape - MiBAC, Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities (Italy) Municipality of Genoa Private company that gave its sponsorship to the workshop Teaching Conservation/Restoration of the Architectural Heritage Goals, Contents and Methods Transactions on Architectural Education No 38 Editors: Stefano F. Musso Luisa De Marco ISBN 2-930301-35-Χ Copyright © 2008 by the authors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm or by any other means without written permission from the publisher. EAAE no 38 Teaching Conservation/Restoration of the Architectural Heritage - Goals, Contents and Methods This book presents the contributions to the workshop that took place at the University of Genoa, Faculty of Architecture, on October 2007, as a new start for the thematic sub- network on Conservation,
    [Show full text]
  • The Meaning of Italian Culture in the Latin American Architecture Historiography
    CADERNOS 19 ROBERTO SEGRE The Meaning of Italian Culture in the Latin American Architecture Historiography. An Autobiographical Essay. ROBERTO SEGRE The Meaning of Italian Culture in the Latin American 291 Architecture Historiography. An Autobiographical Essay. Roberto Segre Picture: Meindert Versteeg (2010) The first years he decision of writing an autobiographical narrative is a difficult task, as- Tsuming as guideline the meaning of Italy and its culture, for seven decades dedicated to the history of Architecture. It gives the impression that telling your own life story is somehow associated with an egocentric, self-recognition content; with the illusion of an idea that personal experiences would be useful to eventual readers. However, at the same time, there is in the world a persis- tent and intense desire of knowing the individualities that through their work contributed to the development of culture and ideas that had some influence on the social development; those who fought for transforming reality by gen- erating new empirical contents, interpretations, discoveries and experiences that could be embraced by future generations. Therefore, reaching an advanced age, we feel the need of stopping, of looking back to the past and following the singer Paolo Conte’s suggestion: “dai, dai, via, via, srola la pellicola”, and thus, reviewing the most significant moments of life: the discoveries during travels, the contact with the masters, the aesthetic and architectonic experiences. Un- doubtedly some autobiographies are still paradigmatic, such as the ones by F.L. Wright and Oscar Niemeyer; or the more intimate and personal ones by Peter Blake, V.G. Sebald or Eric Hobsbawm.
    [Show full text]
  • Of Bologna: Preservation Policies and Reinvention of an Urban Identity Filippo De Pieri and Paolo Scrivano
    Document generated on 10/01/2021 4 a.m. Urban History Review Revue d'histoire urbaine Representing the "Historical Centre" of Bologna: Preservation Policies and Reinvention of an Urban Identity Filippo De Pieri and Paolo Scrivano Volume 33, Number 1, Fall 2004 Article abstract This article analyzes the visual and textual representations of the "historical URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1015673ar centre" of Bologna before and after 1969 the year when the first of the city's DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1015673ar celebrated plans for the preservation of the ancient urban fabric were approved. In spite of the attempts made by architects and planners to precisely See table of contents and "technically" define the object of the plans, the notion of "historical city centre" remained a vague and ambiguous one. Conflicting images of history, tradition, and centrality shaped the preservation policies, and were in turn Publisher(s) reshaped by them. The visual, historical, and political discourse behind the Bologna plans intentionally brought together a multiplicity of local and Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine non-local cultures, resulting in an overall reinvention of both a local identity and an idea of the city of the past. ISSN 0703-0428 (print) 1918-5138 (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article De Pieri, F. & Scrivano, P. (2004). Representing the "Historical Centre" of Bologna: Preservation Policies and Reinvention of an Urban Identity. Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine, 33(1), 34–45. https://doi.org/10.7202/1015673ar All Rights Reserved © Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine, 2004 This document is protected by copyright law.
    [Show full text]
  • Silvia Micheli
    Proceedings of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand 30, Open Papers presented to the 30th Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand held on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, July 2-5, 2013. http://www.griffith.edu.au/conference/sahanz-2013/ Silvia Micheli, “Architecture in a Foreign Language: How Italy has Recognized Foreign Architecture in the Last Twenty Years” in Proceedings of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand: 30, Open, edited by Alexandra Brown and Andrew Leach (Gold Coast, Qld: SAHANZ, 2013), vol. 2, p985-996. ISBN-10: 0-9876055-0-X ISBN-13: 978-0-9876055-0-4 Architecture in a Foreign Language How Italy has Recognized Foreign Architecture in the Last Twenty Years Silvia Micheli University of Queensland Italian architecture of the 1960s and 1970s, thanks to the remarkable design and theoretical contributions of the Tendenza group and the Radicali, soon become influential in the international scene. The intensity of this revolutionary intellectual activity started to wane at the beginning of the 1980s. The exhibition La Presenza del Passato curated by Paolo Portoghesi at the first Venice Biennale of Architecture held in 1980 and Manfredo Tafuri’s publication of the book Storia dell’architettura italiana 1944-1985, through different ideological assumptions, marked the inception of a structural crisis in architecture and opened new horizons for the discipline in Italy. In the last decade scholars have dedicated their studies to the recovery of Italian architectural history of the ‘’60s and ’70s. On the contrary, less attention has been paid to the development of Italian architecture in the following years.
    [Show full text]
  • PAPACY and POLITICS in Eighteenth-Century Rome
    P1: FCH CB614-FM CB614-Collins-v1 January 13, 2004 15:19 PAPACY and POLITICS in eighteenth-century rome pius vi and the arts < Jeffrey Collins University of Washington iii P1: FCH CB614-FM CB614-Collins-v1 January 13, 2004 15:19 published by the press syndicate of the university of cambridge The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, United Kingdom cambridge university press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 2ru,UK 40 West 20th Street, New York, ny 10011-4211, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, vic 3207, Australia Ruiz de Alarcon´ 13, 28014 Madrid, Spain Dock House, The Waterfront, Cape Town 8001, South Africa http://www.cambridge.org C Jeffrey Collins 2004 This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2004 Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge Typefaces Bembo 11/13.25 pt. and Requiem Text HTF System LATEX 2ε [tb] A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Collins, Jeffrey Laird. Papacy and politics in eighteenth-century Rome: Pius VI and the arts / Jeffrey Collins. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-521-80943-6 (hb) 1. Pius VI, Pope, 1717–1799 – Art patronage. 2. Art, Italian – Italy – Rome – 18th century. 3. Christianity and art – Italy – Rome – Catholic Church. 4.Art– Political aspects – Italy – Rome – History – 18th century. I. Title. n5273.2.p58c65 2004 707.94563409033 – dc21 2003053289 Frontispiece: Marco Carloni, Profile Portrait of Pius VI.
    [Show full text]
  • Manfredo Tafuri and Storia Dell'architettura Italiana, 1944-1985’
    CENTRE FOR ARCHITECTURE I THEORY I CRITICISM I HISTORY ATCH Author Leach, Andrew Title ‘”Everything we do is but the larvae of our intentions": Manfredo Tafuri and Storia Dell'Architettura Italiana, 1944-1985’ Date 2002 Source Additions to Architectural History: XIXth Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand ISBN 1864996471 www.uq.edu.au/atch ADDITIONS to architectural history XIXth conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, Brisbane: SAHANZ, 2002 ‘Everything we do is but the larva of our intentions’: Manfredo Tafuri and Storia dell’architettura italiana 1944-1985 ɴʀ ʟʜ Wellington Institute of Technology This paper offers a critical reading of the Manfredo Tafuri’s Storia dell’architettura italiana 1944-1985. Besides a small body of monographic writing, Storia dell’architettura italiana remains Tafuri’s single broad assessment of the polemics of post-War Italian architectural culture. Given its contemporaneity with Tafuri’s own life and career, this paper questions the text’s ‘operative’ dimension. It likewise identifies and questions Tafuri’s absence as ‘actor’ within the text in terms of his ‘authority’ as a writer. Does absence play an active role in the text? Responding to these questions involves an emerging body of ideas attending to Tafuri’s positions on the tasks of history and criticism. Post-War Italian intellectual history sheds further light on a dialectic of knowledge and action significant to Tafuri’s historiographic programme from the late 1960s onwards. The relationship of Storia dell’architettura italiana to Teorie e storia dell’architettura and Progetto e utopia is consequently questioned.
    [Show full text]
  • Princes, Cities, Architects, Manfredo Tafuri, Yale University Press, 2006, 0300111584, 9780300111583, 408 Pages
    Interpreting the Renaissance: Princes, Cities, Architects, Manfredo Tafuri, Yale University Press, 2006, 0300111584, 9780300111583, 408 pages. Manfredo Tafuri (1935–1994) is acknowledged as one of Italy’s most influential architectural historians. In his final work, Interpreting the Renaissance, published here in English for the first time (the Italian edition, Ricerca del Rinascimento, appeared in 1992), Tafuri analyzes Renaissance architecture from a variety of perspectives, exploring questions that occupied him for over thirty years.  What theoretical terms were used to describe the humanist analogy between architecture and language? Is it possible to identify the political motivations behind the period’s new urban strategies? And how does humanism embody both an attachment to tradition and an urge to experiment? Tafuri studies the theory and practice of Renaissance architecture, offering new and compelling readings of its various social, intellectual and cultural contexts, while providing a broad understanding of uses of representation that shaped the entire era. He synthesizes the history of architectural ideas and projects through discussions of the great centers of architectural innovation in Italy (Florence, Rome, and Venice), key patrons from the middle of the fifteenth century (Pope Nicholas V) to the early sixteenth century (Pope Leo X), and crucial figures such as Leon Battista Alberti, Filippo Brunelleschi, Lorenzo de’ Medici, Raphael, Baldassare Castiglione, and Giulio Romano. A magnum opus by one of Europe’s finest scholars, Interpreting the Renaissance is an essential book for anyone interested in the architecture and culture of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Italy.
    [Show full text]