11 Only Architecture Will Be O u r Lives Peter Lung and \Y/ill~ar~ Menkiig
31 53 65 73 Suicidal Desires Peter Long
The Revolt of the Object ~vrllifl~>r r~Ier1kir1g Memories of Superstudio
Cristiarro k r a l d o d i Frarrcia A House of Calm Serenity Adolfo Na~alini 79 Journey to the End of Architecture Piero Frassirrelli
84 Reflected Architecture Superstudio: Historic Projects 95 119 175 213 228 229 1 9 6 6 6 8 . Superarchitecture: to the Rescue! 1969-71. Superprojects: Objects. Monuments, Cities 1972-73. Superesistcnce: Life and Death 1974-78. Supersimple: Elementary Architecture Superstudio: Biographies Superstudio: Exhibitions and B ibliography
Peter b n g
Only Architecture Will Be Our Lives a ~ i dV~lltam I Menk~ng
I
111 thore years i t becarrrc uery clear that 10 contirrue t o dcsigr~ fiirrrrrr~ re, ob~ecrs arrd similar household decorariotrs ruas rro solutiorr t o problnrrs of liuirrg arrd 1101 euerr t o those of life, arrd cue12 less could i t serue t o save one's otun soul.. . I t becarrre clear that rro beautrfication or c o s ~ ~ ~ e ru c r e ~ i e ntfficiio7t t o rerrredy the darlrage of tinre, the error s ofnrarr arrd the bestiality of architecture.. . The oroblern therefore was tha t o f irrcreasirr~delac/~rrrenl frorrz , those activities ofdesigrr adopting per haps the theory ofrrrinirrral force i n a ~ e r r e m"process of rrdrrctiorl". l ~
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For those w l ~ o like ourrelues, are conuirrced that arcl~itecturc , is one oft hefew wags t o realize cosrrric order on earth, t o put thir~gs
I, : I I I
t o order arrd abouc a l l t o affirtrr hrrrrrarrityi capacityfor acting accordi r~gl o reasorr, it is a "rrroderate utopia" t o frrragirre a riear frrture irr w h i c l ~ l l arcl~itec~ure be created w i t h a s i r ~ ~oct, a tuill le frorr r a srrigle desrgn capable o f c l a r r ~ r n gonce arrd for a l l the rrrotiue .r ruhich have irrdrrced rrran t o build dolrrrens, nrrtlhirs, pyrarrrids, and b stly t o trnce (ultirrra ratio) n luhrre line rn the desert. SUPERSTUDIO, The Co rrfirruous Morrunrenr: Atr Arrhirec~ural Model for Total Urbanrzation, 196Y !Ij
5 I J
In ,ronl
most g r a p h ~ c aspects of these 1960s protagonists to today's pub11c The col lect~ve shows lack, ho\r,ever, suffic~ent space to explore ~ndlv~dual groups or speclfic actlons In greater deta~l 'Though the many e ~ h ~ b ~ t l andsdustrate d catalogues have done a respectable on
1: fi 11 ,i:
job of d ~ s s e m l n a t l n ~ consequently revlvlng the works of a preand don i~nanrlv European Rdd~cal archttecture movement over the last
the world's apparently boundless resources is now having to fight to retain that dubious right. And just as Italy's cconomic miracle
iI
mary materials from this period are simply hard to come by: This is particularly unfortunate for SUI'BKIUDIO who seem to have acquired the role as the Radical m ovement's cover-child.' Scant little
ning of the new millennium. N o better moment, then, to turn back the pages of h istory to that previous era when a similarly ample crisis ripped through rhe wor ld economies: welcome to Italy in the
1 '1 L
understanding SUPEIISTUDIO'S provenance and the group's relationship to the many cultural currents evolving through the European avant-garde in the 1960s. Since none of these takes place in the distant past, most of the original protagonist s are still very active on the scene, though their current identities are not al ways transparently linked to their epic endeavours of youth. While clearly a thi rty-year hiatus suggests a certain amount of aging many of the principal actors remain highIv enereetic and active in the field while their works remain tucked we are ironically trawling into a new kind of pop-~rp culture! What remains to b e seen, however, is whether the recent 1960s' revival emerging in the schools an d in some of the more progressive of- $ P fices goes beyond mere fashion trends. ' H A definitive and momentous transformation took place in the design and archi tectural environment by the late 1960s: the increasingly debilitating crisis in Modernist architecture would find some of its most laconic last acts played out on the drawing boards : , ~reciselv here in Florence. Each group challenged and eventuallv
2 '1 ! 1
cia. Roberto Maeris. Piero Frassinelli and Alessandro Magris were sewed to indoctrinate society into an irrelevant culture of con-12
rators were trusted with their time and given open access to their remaining col lection of projects and library. This publication has therefore been planncd and organizcd to seme as a portable reference focusing primarily on s u ~ e n s r u ~ r o ' s critical writings i ~ relation to their better-known body of designs r and architecture. O n e of the most unexpected conclusions we as curators can draw from our invo~vement with SUI'ERSTUDIO is just how conscious the group was from the outset of the historical importance of its investigations: SUPElUTUDlO maintains an impressive archive that from the start nieticulously docutnents the unfolding process of its critical research. While it's evident upon examining t he material presented here that their most renowned images describe the momentou
s steps in thc group's philosophical development, these inlages can only partly convey the complete historical passage. For this reason we have decided to initi ate an operation of recovery, restituting in the process those projects and writ ings -critical texts and storyboards - that are far less familiar but entirely n ecessary in providing a more complete understanding of the group's oeuvre. 'l'he timing for this revived interest in the 1960s' counter-culture is not that arbi trary either: we are again at a point where the convergence of technology and co nsumeristn, in its current socalled free market state is spinning steadily out o f control: the small percentage of the global population still able to command evocative images, the series beginning in 1969 titled The Conlinuor~sMonumen~, s pread its glacially translucent grid structures throughout entire regions of the planet enveloping buildings and entire cities, creating a monument to end all m onuments. s u l m STUDIO'S renouncement of architecture, their conscious withdra wal from the perverse system based on the con~mercialisationof popular demand, w as deliberately intended to strip architecture of everything except its most nak ed living truth. This publication is structured into two basic parts. Part I fea tures the nvo curators' essays exanlining SUPEIUTUDIO'S history within the Flore ntine context ("Suicidal Desires", Peter Lang), and an essay on s u ~ e ~ u r u ~ rpenultimate moment on the o's larger international sccne ("The Revolt of the Object", William Menking), and includes the retrospective testimonials and criti cal reflections from three of S U I ~ E I ~ T U D I O ' S nlembers: Adolfo Natal ini, Cristiano Toraldo di Francia and Piero Frassinelli. Part I1 is divided into the following four chapters: E 1. 196G68: S U I ' E W ~ C ~ ~ I C C I U ~to the Rescue! 2. 1969-71: SUI'Ellproj~ctr:Objects, Monuo1cnts, Cities 3. 1972-73: SUI 'ERexlsle~lce: Life and Death 4. 1974-78: s u ~ > e ~ i ~ n Elementary Architect ure ple: In Part I1 each chapter engages in a specific historical moment and pro vidcs related documentation on SUI~E~STUDIO'S theoretical and
1 ! 1. i $: p 13 4 4 $:
!
practical responses. The goal is to publish the group's niost significant projec ts along with a related collection of images and their accompanying writings, st oryboards and photos. While this publication is nor intended to become a catalog ue raisonnk on the works of SUI>ERSTUDIO, been conceived as a work of conit has sultation and reflection. Here every atteliipt has been made to pair significant texts and storyboards to their corresponding architectural projects. This intro ductory essay will navigate through some of the peak episodes that mark SUPERSTU DIO'S architectural
pro-The quickest link between the two groups SUPERSTUDIO
and
coming out of a particularly Florentine phenomenon that could, we
the catchall phrase used to regroup the variety of tendencies that have aspired to shake off the liegemonic grip of modernist archius tecture in the 1960s. Radi cal architecture is an a m b i g ~ ~ omultive. lent term that suggests different and clearly contrasting meanings. Andrea Branzi, one of the founding members of Archizoom, writing in 1973, gave this impression on the breadth of Radical move ment: "Today the term 'Radical' architecture assembles at the international leve l all of the eccentric experimentation with regard to the straight line of the p rofession: counterdesign, conceptual architecture, primitive technologies, eclec ticism, iconoclasm, neodadism. nomadism..."' Gianni Pettena, another Radical pla yer active at the time in Florence, insists on giving the movelnent a more sinuo usly fluid radiance, albeit with continental distinctions, weaving the 111g o r ~ o ~experiments of the Californian Radicals to the more self-conir scious langu age emerging in England, Austria and Italy, whose works result from far deeper f rustrations characterizing the profession in Europe.'" In effect. Pettena's pano ramic view of the movement correctly depicts the international exchanges, throug h publications, encounters and exhibitions, while devoting considerably less tim e to the msny provincial accents buried in the chaos of translation, misreading, and local cultural wrangling. Finally Emilio Ambasz's conception for T h e Neru Dorncrtic Lorzdrcope makes the point that even \\,ithin Florentine circle of vi sionary architects there \\.ere several contradictory positions regarding the ro le of ilrchitecrurc and design -let alone radical politics. T h e weakness in es tablishing ;In umbrella definition for the Radical architecture movement therefo re remains, we believe, in the often-contradictory positions held by these disti nctive activist groups. The Radical bind between the groups does not necessarily imply that there were common denominators linking one to another, as clearly th ose who saw themselves as neodadists were not necessarily willing to also act as nomadisrs. Branzi's intent was to underscore just how insidiously the work of s uch a diverse num14 ber of subversive credos were penetrating the 1960s' mainstr eam
the scenes, the story of just how the two groups were founded is tied as much to circumstances as it was to a prescient vision.'' circle in the early 1960s, was asked by the Jolly gallery in Pistoia to mount a second show of his paintings i n November 1966.
In-to Corretti, Paolo Deganello and Massimo Morozzi chose the des-his exhibition manifesto.
16
first date would have turned out to be catastrophic. O n 4 November, an Italian national holiday, the Arno river overran its banks, flooding Florence and the re st of the valley. Natalini recounts how he found himself almost under water as h e worked through the night on the graphics for the Modena exhibition poster." In need of a dry place ro work, Natalini went to his friend Cristiano Toraldo di F rancia, who knew of a place to rent on high ground. Shortly aftenvards they foun ded together the first SupERSTuDlo office at Via Bellosguardo 1. SUPERSTUDIO rea lly only appears in some kind of recognizable form some time after the second sh ow in Modena, lagging a bit behind Archizoom." In fact, it would take roughly a year for Adolfo Natalini and Cristi:mo Toraldo di Francia to collectively gather their forces to give a philosophical foundation to SUPERSTUDIO. Natalini's thes is project on an art centre for Florence, begun in 1964 under the direction of L eonardo Savioli, influenced him to study Louis Kahn. From Kahn, Natalini immerse d himself in the history of monuments, a work that he himself has qualified as a work benveen "pop and the monumental".'~oraldodi Franciak thesis presented in 1 968, a "Machine for Vacations", represented a dialectical investigation into tec hnology and the evolving social realm. In 1967 Roberto Magris entered the Bellos guardo office, adding his experience in working within the industrial design fie ld. Piero Frassinelli joined SUPERSI'UDIO in early April 1968. Fmssinelli's univ ersity research combined anthropology with architecture, a background that provi ded him with exceptional skills in writing and storytelling.'' Over the course o f 1967, SuPERSTuDIO laboured to establish three categories for future research: the "architecture of the monument"; the "architecture of the image"; and "tecnom orphic architecture". Natalini's 1966 thesis on the Palazzo dell'Arte served as the initial genesis for the group's work on the architecture of the monument, la ter developed with greater refinement in the competition for the Fortezza da Bas so completed in 1967. The second category, on the architecture of the image, ins pired the graphic-visual research behind the beguiling renderings that became th e group's renowned signature. The architecture of the image provoked an extensiv e visual experimentation into techniques and appliques, appropriating from diver se sources, such as collage, pop art, cinema and dada.ln Toraldo di Francis's un iversity thesis set the stage for a scientific-based research, using technology as an interface medium for architecture." From these preliminary three categorie s developed the first major critical project proposed by SUPERSTUDIO:the Journey info theRea11n ojReason, an illustrated storyboard created to serve as "maps fo r orientation ..." describing the unfolding relationship benveen natural and art ificial environments. This pictorial
exege-/1 1 !
P~sloia. December 196G Adolo Nalalnl. Andrea Bran28 and Masslmo Morozz, ICr#rlia no Toraldo dl Francla 1 laklng s the p ~ c ~ u r e l
. .
2 6 progressive visions on man and his relation to the built environment. The st oryboard narrative, already developed as a form
office, in that they attempted to create more than a semblance of a legitimate p ractice, while all the while seeking to enzlsperate the per" charged actions. Th e "super" code of conduct required that homes and offices of a prospecrive well-off clientele. They were "super-operators", and as such producers of designs and objects that would be over-loaded with symbolism and poetic content. As SUPERST UDIO'S designs confounded the sense of scale and objective significance, the uns
uspecting user \vould find him or herself bccoming part of the critical process of the design. The making and shaping of these objects were consistently related to bricolage techniques, assemblies from exisring manufactured productions, or adaptations from outside industries, such as
suporr~d~o,ha vfa~ C I I L tn Mantcllato olllce 1981
these subvers~ve objects they reallzed " l n ~ t ~ a t e d a new level of con su merlsm, and consequently another level of poverty" '"Havlng recoenlzed the futll ltv of the strategy, S U P E ~ T U D I O retrenched.
i 1
e Just l ~ k the m in had become powerful tool for all 11s bare slmone long pllc lty, SUPERSTUDIO called for people " to live l ~ k e protest ", to engage In a l ife long " be in Every object has a 4 pract~calfunctlon and a contemplative one and ~tIS the latter that evasion d e s ~ g n seeklng to potentlate Thus there 1s an end to the $ 1s 19th-century myths of reason as the explanation of everythin g, the 5 thousand varlat~onson the theme of the four leaned chalr, aero
_ I 1' I!; '
s u P c n s T u D r o made yet another leap foniard, abandoning the last -.
vestiges of a market-driven architecture, erasing once and for all I
plest a physlcal bar graph, the addltlon of the histograms to the ij j/l I i I i 1!11 I
for other more pressing activities. "We prepared a catalogue of tri-dimensional non-contin"ous diagrams, a catalogue of histograms of architmure with reference to a grid transportable in diverse areas or scales for the edification of a natu re both serene and immobile in mhich we might finally recognize (re-know) oursel ves. From the catalogue of histograms followed effortlessly objects, furniture, environments and architecture... . But all these things didn't matter much, nor have they ever mattered much. The surface of such hisroarams was
homo-1 /!i/I! /I/ /I! !t!
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were also called 'the tombs of the architects'"."
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with the four members posing at its base, and an owl in the forefront gliding st raight towards the viewer. The image, a morbid group critique, nonetheless came in the shape of a riddle. A sort of death wish so beautiful and entrancing that the message really didn't seem to matter.
nntive para<ligm, onc step ~t t i ~ n e As Natalini cmphasizc~l "By tht. destruc tion of objects, \\,c mean tlie destr~ctionof their artributes of 'srarus' 2nd t he conr~ot.ltions ilnposcd t,y powcr, so objects .reduced to the con<lirionof nc urro! and that we live w ~ t h disposable elements) 2nd nor for objects. Dy thc elimination o i thc city, we m a n tlic elin~in:~rion the accumulation of formal strucof d tures of power - the elimin~tionof thc clty 3s Ilier~rchy~ n social m odel, looking for n new freeeg~litarian t e , In \vIiich cverym one can reach <l ifferenr gralles in the rlcveloprncnt of his possi. bilities, b~.g~nning equal s tarting i)oinrs. By the e n J of work, from we mean the end of spcci:~lize~l rcp critive work Seen as an on4
sewe~l:'' ..SUPLRSTUDIO. led by Adolfo Nntalinl, started in 1966 ~~y'~,",:$'~~," ,","~~,",':"I ro produce a body of work which was more or less divided betwecn r epresenting the form of .I 'Continuous Monument' as a mute ur- s - o e ~ ~ ~ ~ n : ~ c l - ~ e e 2 h D ' c " """e"" ' 'I ban sign and proclucing a scricr oivign ertcs illustrating ,I world from which consumer goods had !xen elilninated Their work varied from the projection of v ~ s ~ m ~ c n e t r n bmeg.~l~rhs, c e d m irror-&ss. t le f ~ in to thc <lcpicrlon of 3 sr~ence.fictionIsndscape in which nature had been rcndcrcd benevolent '.i'The whole operation, Frampton may t,e su ggesting, should not be ~nterprete<l n monulnent.il form ocas cupying an existin g Ian~lscope,but instcnd J plisntom projection across.3 strangely .~ltcre<l spar i.~l.ten~por.~l cont~nuu:~~." Charles Jencks preferred to inrcrprct I%eCbt~trnt~ utrr .\lonr~t?ti9trt 35 3Jacobin ~rchitecture, rcvo~utionorybu! despotic He fail ed ulrlrnately in recollciling tlic ironic self-cr~tque that functione~lCIS a ~l ~sorclering col~rrol mcclinnis~n Fur if Jencks was not convinced that the Monume nt's haunting mcss~gc coul<lbe so f.~lse, Kenneth Frampton's interpretation of S U I ~ ~ K S ~picked up on a counter ~DIO c ~ ~ l t umessage, that he recognized to be veiled bclou the image r~l itself. ' Bcyoncl the rule of thc perforrn~nce principle" noted Framp. ton, ' u . h ~ c hthe philosopher Herberr Marcuse had a lread) char. ~ c t e r i r c das defit~lng11fe In tcrms of instruments .lnrl con sumer gooJs. surlLmrunro projecte<l n sllenr. anti-futurisr :~ncltechnologicslly optimistic utopia . . " According to Frnml)ron. ' i t 15 s ~ g . n~ficnntthat ( ~JI'LRSIUUIO chose to represent sucl~ non-repress~ve 3 world in terms of an arcl ~itecrure h ~ was virtually invis~blc,or. t t where v~siblc, totnlly uselcss an1 1 by clcs~gnauto-destructive" ' comes Frampton's read on \ u P r n r l ~ o ~ ~ ~ nllchncarer to the group's original intent, ~ I I 111scommentary .~lso I confirm s tl1.11 f i r . C'utrt~trr~utrr .\lotrr~rnr,~r/ nor so cloakc<lin irony alld al nbigul. ~vas I, .I, to lack legibilirv turrnsrunro c<lnscio~~sly examined each u laycr ~n the proccss of <lesign 2nd arch~tccture butlt its alter. and
"' "
Lrlcr /or C'l,rirtm.lr: I'rr~ttronitio,rro/thr. .\lyrticol RL.birrhu/ Ur. bfitrr mi, appe~ring the D ~ e l n b e r in I971 I S S U ~ AD. 111ahnost evcry of "lded " city the pre<lominant tlic~nu u,os aI)out blind fnitli in rcclinological salvn tion and the looming cffccrr of the A m c r i c a ~ ~ i z ~ t ~ o n
or)
hobitants, exccpt ~nsome cast. \!.here one might think of d c v i a ~ ~ n . . . g "'l'he i n h ~ b ~ t a nIlve ~n the machine endlessly drugged along Ijy ts con veyor bclrs, by chutes and pneulnaric tubes from tllc time of birth to rhc rilnc of death The machine takes c ~ r of c v c ~ t h i n g . e along the innumcrJbls routcs \vliich intersccr, unltu and divide 3ccording to the ~ncolnprehensit,lc progrnmming o l the m ~ c h i n c . Thc inhi~bitnnts ~ n d f food and (car, slee p an11 juy, sex n l ~ dhope. l death ~ n l anger, solnetimes also rcbcll~on,bur thcy know very well 11131if they get off r l i e o b l ~ g ~ r rou:es establishe d by the InJor~ chine, they will rncvitat>ly bc crushucl by 11s mach~nery."" the , Once SUPLKS'rLDIO finlshcrl p r o d ~ l c ~ n g 7ir r9lve 7 ~ l r , rthcy , '
lislicd a short uns~gneclreview on pagc 29 titlcd '12 Citti dcl futuro" ( I 2 ci ties of the future^.'. 'l'he revieu~errum~rkccl."l'hc 21ternativc 1)rol)os3lsby Super-studio' appear in succusslon Inscd on ar! im~ginary, iml)oss~ble playfid a rchirectu~"An i n r c w . u.~tIi :lnJ ~ A~lolfo Nat~linifollowed. Natal~ni, any event, hncl sent our scvin era1 dozcn copies of the 7ir;,lvL, 7hlr.r to Italiar p ~ p e r s including , I1 .\lotrdu. I1 .\lutrdu's cultural c<litorduring tlicsc ycars wns l t ~ l o ZI
I I
Though the connection remains speculative - what kind of influence would the svP EllsruD1o piece have had on Calvino if he had indeed read it in 1971 - the coinc idence nonetheless renlains intriguing. Calvino's short stories had a vast influ ence on the general public, not to mention a whole generation of architects. Ano ther cautionary tale? Also durine this time sulJaHs.ruolo began the production o f its
background In one rnemorable scene w h ~ l e rhythlns are heard the n~elodlcallv In the backeround the astronauts. seen feedme on
reconsideration of domestic space. SUPERS.rUDIOcollage their slick drawings of s atellites, desert landscapes and people in the act of
fa-Vk ?f I' 1
the effects arc indeed at times simplistic, but nonetheless powerful precisely b ecause the hypcr-gadgetry of space-capsule life is suderr denly reduced to a tri bal ritc." A poetic re~nise sci.~iein which the real protegonis;~are the histogr am objects that penetrate the galaxy. SUI'ERSTUDIO'S incursion into the world of film begins far from earth: evcrvrhinn, "from the moon to the planets is archi-"no intention of doing withoutn."She is depicted sadly marooned amid her applian ces on r small grass island in the middle of a plane "wirhout any messages in bo ttles". In the catalogue this image is the foil for another, T h e Disinril Mou, lroin, urhich portrays a youthful sybarite world of nomadic pleasures not enslav ed to designed objects of mass consumption but free to experience their
a nostalgia precisely for primal knowledge on earth. oarticioated in thc Museum of Modern In 1972 I;UI'EIISTU!JIO
to remove all commercially driven clutter from the object, o r the architecture: as in their FiueSuburbor~I'illos project, each
super-iijjl $jilt fi!ig
Their ~ n s s f l o rplastic lamp was selected by the show's c u n t o r ~ Emili o Ambasz for the "Obiects" section of the exhibit. In
addi-titr~rorrs M o , ~ a , ~ e r i ~ r indecorously neutralized layers of gratuitous
his-torical symbolisms associated with the making of monumental
ar-logue.'" This project, which took the form of a small plastic model, repeated ro infinity in a cubed light box. As they describe it is " . . . a reconsideration of thc relations between the process of design and the environment through ;In alter~lative model of existence"." The images reproduced in the catalogue ore ni ne variations from their film project Life, Srrpcrsurfnce and remain one of thei r
outside this burdensome dichotomy. SUIXI&UDIO, beginning with the MOCIA show, so ught to re-conceptualize the position of urchitecture altogether They discarded the role of the c r e n o r the d e signer, the architect. Instead, the group mo
ved to espouse the complete reversal of the normative condition, to switch roles , co find architecture in one's olun life.
(jp .i id pi
I
tempts to rake arcliitccturc onto n dlffcrent philosophic~l plnte.111. Renvecn 1 972 2nd 1973. Carrhrllo published $I'PEIL%TL'DIO~ ttor y b o ~ r d s n texts for t l ~ c I I CF1~11da,,:r,it.7l ~ d F , Bctr: I.r/c. Edtica!to,:, Ct,n,,~to~ty, C, and Death. The prolecr, of tre~nc.ndous Lo1 scope ~ n vision, conternplntes t he existence of rhc architect, the W I I II ( , d co~~tplrt Iifc. Coriccivcd as :an experimental film opus, orily I.r/e, on St~prrrt~r/acc Ccre,~o,r) were compl eted in f ~ l ~ n and version. S N pr,rrt,r/.rn,, a collage anllnntion with its flnnl scquencc filmcd outdoors in nature with n )oung couple, was screened for t he MO\IA exhibition TI>?Nero Do,~rrtrcLn~~drcapc 1972.' C P ~ L ~ I Iwns I ~ ) ~ n IO shot IIVC ~n Florcncc the follo\v~n; year: The illustr:~tedtcxts for thc Fr fih Ftorda111e,,t.11 Act Death wns set to a slidc show a t t h nn audlo soundtra ck. 'rhc FILC ! l ~ ~ d r ~ t ~ ~ ~ ~ t . 7 1 F Acts \\,ere published In series in rtor) honrd forrnx. Llke the one for T/>/,r~Co~tt~~tt,~trr Alo~tIO?IPN~,stor) boards for the I:r~c I O I ~ ~ I I I L ~ Nd~ ~ ~ c t ~cC ~ T the F were ~ d / ~ i In nnturc. sUllEalulIto's rn3nifcsto states: "Architecture never touches the g reat thelnes, the fundnrnen131 tliclncs of our lives. I\rcliitecturc relnains 3t the limit, arid Intcrvenes only 31 3 ccrta~ripoint in tlic process, usually whe n hchnviour 113s dreadYbeen entlrely codified, furnishing answers to rigidly sta ted problems Even if 11s answers .Ire nberr:lnt or evn.
Solo charr
dcrnically founded stilrl) on the making of peasnnt tools and sheltcrj. The move cotr~cided with rhe co-tounding ot Global Tools 111 1973, a sliort-IivcJ but s~ gri~ficont mcctlrlg of niirids bcrwccn rlic far flurig rncmbcrs of the Radical . ~rchitccturelnovemcnt. Their collecrivc s t r ~ t c g ~ ethough never renl~zcdw: rhln r h ~ s s, s:lmc enselnble, nonetheless moved parallel with the S U I ~ C R \ur~ro'ssccond I phase oiproduction. Rut it should be c l e x that \\,hat S L I ' E R ~ T U D ~ ~ brought to their phase of research was the intcrisivc desire not to repeat the forrnul~ h ~ would onl) serve to prolorig the conuncrt r ~ 1 3 rnnrkct.oriented cxplolt3tion of the deigrl profession Of course 1 tlils would h e hy riow irnposs~blcto persevere, liowcver, given the
26
strurncnts nccuratcly predisposrd to avold nny dev~arion 'rhc working-class holn c rcsernbles a st3tcly vllln in the sarnc 1t13y3s tlie dcsi<n of 3 Radical .irch itect that of :~ri acadernlc or re:~ction.~ry nrcli~tcct.thc differcnce Ires onl y in the quantities i r ~ of ltv~ng hnvc 31rc3dy hcen made. play, thv decisions on the Accepting his rolc, the nrchitcct bccolnes nccornplice to the rnachu~at~o r~s system Then the av.int-gnrdc architect f d s one of the of the nost r~gldlyh xed roles dike the young lover 111 p l . ~ y s ~ . This tent~ttveanthropologicnl and ph~losophicalfound.iriori of architccturc becomes the centre of our reducti ve process."" SUI'LIISTUD!~, lnlght nrgue, succeeded In cleansing ~ r c h i one tccture of all so-rces of contamlnntlon The only quancl.iry that \\,auld r e m a n , of course, is what does In fact arcli~rccturc look likc \\,hen ) o u have t he chance ro hcgln all over, \vhcn you c3n expcrlencc 11 through merely I l v ~ n when you c.in move freely 3cross ~, the lsndscnpe rns~de clty of tlic mind' n File Ftrndarnrtifol ,Icfr srrs in motion such a level of dcstabtlization that th ere would in f.1~1 ~lrnost recourse to .iction poshe no s.ble :~fterwnrds, seque l truly possible. After 1973, the work of no xPcunr)~o entered by fiar into 3 se concl plirse ~ r wliicli the group. i ns Peter Lang polnts our in Su~cirlnl Desi rss". reconsrirutcs thcmselves as best 3s the) cln, by shifting llle ~ O C L I o f the11 resenrch on. S to t l ~ prlm.lr) building blocks ~hemsclvcs, c rlirough .in inrensivc
aca-rnentir~griot just the style of life 111 the far renchcs of the Italian cour~try slde, nlso the rigours of poverty. It Iielpcd to dcvclop hut liantly creative i
r i the use of rcc)cled matcri~ls, energy conscrvntion, distributed recourses. 3 r d multiple uses. The resc3rcli and
tcrial Cultt,rc project suggests some very inrerest~ngaltcrnntive p ~ h to folio\\, now. s
If SUI~EWTUDIOhas succeeded in contributing to any particure lar lesson to inven ting a f ~ ~ t uarchitecture, it would be not so much the individual "pieces" as it would be the process itself, the strict critical vision focused on their own roles in the much larger chain of production. This process of repeatedly and cr itically re-esamining the normal drifts and currents moving across the domestic landscapes has led them to design, or perhaps more appropri;~tely to un-design t heir surroundings like no other group before or after them. We are far enough al ong again to perform similarly criticnl interrogations and we hope as the editor s of this project that SUPCRSTUDIO'S contribution may be to take another, c r i t i c r ~look l at the objects that surround our lives.
su~rta-ru~>~o. 'His~o. ' Sar.th Dcyong plsced roo hlonumenrContinu 1969". 115.l' .1<b. xrsms", rcprinted in / I , ' , mucll emphasis on thc L.iUo,sr~~,~a(no. . v r,rrro,re dell,, ri,per/ior merabolis~r'influences re- April 2001. 80). ~ i o r r n i Wr,,,r,ir,. ~r;lnal. Knrding~helrdlidnRroupa. " A. Brrnzi. "lnrroducPeccr L.mg iMil;>n: CdiS. Dcyonp. "M~.moricao f ciun". ~n1 Nuvoncand R. . ' r m n i Pr int. 1972. 19). I~L. Urban Foturc", i n T. Orlztndini, Archr/c~!~,rd 1 aut~t.t~~ iuoto. Con- Riley. ed.. The (%d,igbrg 0 Kad?c~lr.iblilun: Docu. 'The tinuourMonl uuc~~t".Du,~~ir rbc,lvu,rr.G~rrdc; \/I/iria,,un. tnenti di C;lr.thclla, 1974. (n o. 481, Dccember 1969). Arcl~irccrrrriDnirm,,~g~/n,~,,14). Brrnri strc>serlin ;I rc~i,r cent ~nrervieu, 1 It~clical rh. ' 'I'he ~ u m ~ "lndicitl", f ~ r r ~r b c l l o r ~ w r d G i / ~ ~<.;,ll,(/r,c. rion (Ne\r. York: a!oat,\, rrcbi~cc~ur ei~~;lr ; rcc. "not l coined by Ccrmnno CrLnr t describc ;) \rhole r n n ~ e 200 2. 31). o opniznble lungudgc" r n d rhdr ir encornpurred "... of arustic pracric er, i r too A aut,r.siuoto. dirbdndcd g~ncrrl. h e r u r h o n ~ beliwc, i n 198 6, rcconsrirured ir. m;my rmdly:oups a,ithour o t ~ d ~ c r i h t h c s p e c ~ f i c r n ,elf in rhc 1990s l b c r ~ c r a bix rhcmc . Percr L ~ n y il i ~ ~ ~ l 0 f ~ u 1 ~ 1 3bucn,c 1 O : 6 1 ~ ~ adminirrcr ixr current and 1Villi.lm Menk inx.
in-' '
hibir. concetved ro displt~y primsrily thusis projec,s. l'ct~.r L;mg, inturvieiv a.ir11 Adolfo h';t,;lli[~i iFlorcncu. I4 Decembcr 2002) " For rhe lncn>hcrs o f :" I'erer
1982. L.lng. inrcr!,iew wtrh Crnstl;~noTorsldo d i Fr.lncl;~ (Filotrfilno. 7 Dec ember 2002). : ' , u t ~ ~ a m o ~ "Invendon o,
to its soundrmck, and requires further res~omcion. Irrrerplioi~~~u~,I~chitcc~~~r(~,
1r;llion voice avcr. !r.ilh soundrrack, producerl by
b~.com,ngits ~pllyscc~l emic.11~:Design and Archifoundcn in 1966. Roberto "'C.Pc rrenu, "Archicer~uia rccrurc 1960/75", i n VI b b g r i r joincd i n 1967. Redic ale", i n Arc11,r~clrrre ,Lf\.lortr"l,rrenirrri,~~~nI~~ Picro Fr.~rsinelliin 196 8 mdicdcnle icir. 11). delm d Almsandm M a g r ~ s ~ ~ n" Roben Vcnruri. Dcnisc d I B;e,,rrolc dr Ve,iez,n. cx. t , hibirion cnr;llogoe (Flo- Aleaarndro Poli i n 1970. Sco~r BmunnndS~wcLen1'011 lcfi rhc group in 1972. our. \vho,c writlngr \ r.erL. rcnce: Ven~ll;~bro. 1996); Arch,rrcrrrr nalrnb,eshi. Frb~nces Urunror 1rd ns1;ttcd highly respec14 nnlong [he bl~ioo cnh~logue.Villcursulan.\ruolc tcrts f rom Radical community, wcrc b.>nne. Inrritut d i r r con- l e l i a n ro C n ~ l i r hfor thc qu~cklocriricire~hcmoveI C I ~ I ~ M ~ I > - ~,i(.,Jt~nuoryinternr rionsl journals and metx: 'IIo\r,e\,er. no erclliblay ZOO1 iBlrcclon;l: Di. maga zines. l e c t ~ r e l 6 O he PIIS\YCI 10 ~ L agon;llc, 2001); D . Sourif, : Pop
-ups ure thole n;~p t o o n ~ u c b n r c h i ~ e c ~ u r e . ~ e ed.,C,,:~rr,,, ~?rd:Arrr ?brc,i. xlng lirrle lnrerner rdver- rerction of thc anti-archi,ru IY68 -IY8Y, cxh~hirlon tisenlenrr chsr ere increar. rm~rof~iDirp.rl~~pri~sfuc.tr,dogu e(Ilorrncc:iM&IM, ingly jumping onto the ~ i l e the endless fondling ar 2002): 7'brCl~n,rgbigo/~/1~~ computur screens. ofiirelev;mr rubdccicr rr chc dircuns~on other excrmlc i n the orhcr Ava~ir-Gurdc, e x h i b i ~ i o l l " F o r n de~ui led on the contemporaly Icgil. mafizinm, though il is porC.ICJIO~~~, York, Thc N e\v cy o f aut'altiruolo rec D , sibly Ins h r r n ~ f uonly bcl Mureurn o f Mod ern Arr (New York: ,~~ostn. 2002). Rouillard. "Supcrr~udio: c u r e ir seldom ge ls builr. bodimenr. This is onc oi rlie srgumcncr developer1 in Peter Lnnx's ess ay "Sui. York: Anchor Uookr. " lhrrl 248. " 1973. X r 5 7 ) . " {hid ". lb,d rbrd 2.18--19. 28
32
Fascist regime contributed to the invention of Italian mass society, but did not construct a mass consumer culture. That \vould be the accomplishment of the pos t-war governments, whose laws were designed to promote private investments to th e exclusion of all else. Private initiatives in housing were given a "free hand" , urith no co~itrolsplaced on land uses, adequate service facilities like parks or parking lots, nor sufficient safety regulations to ensure proper building met hods.' The results were catastrophic, with sl>eculative buildings spm\rrling ran domly through the urban peripheries and under reinforced buildings tragically co llapsing in known high-risk earthquake zones. Italians were becoming more mobile , more urban, more enatnoured with their object world, but adapting to this new consumer-oriented lifestyle inevitably meant ruptures to traditional habits. Eco nomic expansion came late relative to other European countries, but the symptonl s of estrangement among the post-war Italian middle classes bore the common trai ts of similar Western industrialized countries. The gro\\~ingprosperity within t he Italinn society exposed ever-deepening rifts urithin the communities at large , as well as intergenerational conflicts. During the 1960s the student populatio n in the national university system doubled to half a nill lion students, provid ing sufficient momentum behind the rise of a mass student culture.' This gradual slide towards social breakdown was brought into explicit view through the work of some of the country's most creative cinematographic artists. As Siegfied Krac auer noted, "the more life is submerged, the more it needs the artwork, which un seals its withdrawnness and puts its pieces back in place..."' Aesthetic manifes tations depicting the general malaise of Italy's upwardly mobile classes and ali eliated youth increasingly surfaced in the arts and in cinema by the mid-1960s. After La r l o b vita was released in 1960, Federico Fellini turned the camera o n himself and his profession, creating in 1963 Eight and a Hnlf, a spectacularly personal inquiry and psychological confession on the existential state of cinem a and society. Michelangelo Antonioni in his 1964 film Red Desert, constructed a spiritually deprived vision of postlinked to a devastated landscape war Iraly t hat was her~neticall~ of smog-choked fiactories and polluted landscapes. As the characters move with empty gestures through Red Desert's world of manufactured s ensations, only a siren-like song seems to penetrate the ambient stupor. The pri mal recall remains an insidious reminder of a simpler past, a symbolic metaphor that would find its echo in the reflections on che builc environment among the y oung generation of architects who would form the nucleus of sUl%l<n'ut11().' Ove r the course of their activities, SUl~ElaTUDlO elaborated on the grand themes of alienation, rationalization, neuroses, therapy and the visceral fortns of suici de. These themes informed the
un-derlying critique that constituted the group's thoughts and actions from the ini tial founding in 1966 to thelate 1970s. But these epic themes also can be seen t o reflect tnore formulative life trajectories. The story of SUPEilSTUDfO,whose b eginnings are announced in the historical staging of the 1966 Superarchitectnre exhibit in Pistoia, finds its inception in Florence's rebellious youth culture. SUPLRSTUDIO'S genesis, in fact, cannot be linked to a specific student movetnent - the six members of the group did not come from the same ideological backgroun d or belong to the same student
tablished its characteristic identity.' In many aspccts SUI'ERSTUDIO was formed just as their name implied, as a "super-office", a design and architectural offi ce that happened to have an extremely deep and foreboding sense of history and b elligerent behaviour. it Yet to understand SUI~LRSTUDIO remains essential to und erstand the university climate that existed in Florence during the 1960s, precis ely because the generation of students who completed their e d u ~ l t i o n the re were marked much differently than
else-modernization; the university administered itself as the pedantic gatekeeper of this very same cultural legacy, and thc more innovative faculties found themselv
es isolated if not removed from participating in the city's architectural and ur ban development. The
different directions. These are therefore the issues to follow in order to get t o the heart of suPel?srumo's deeply internalized rebellion against architecture. 'rlie entire national university was put to test in the 1960s, pressured by stu dents and many of thc faculties to renovate the archaic
36
gree. Zevi's American connections and deep dedication to reforming Italian archi tectural culture had immediate impact on post-war debates. H e quickly establish ed under the aegis of AI'OA the first "organic school" in Italy inspired largely by Frank Lloyd Wright. Many younger Italian architects joined efforts with Zevi in reconstituting the Roman scene. O n e of the challenges was to re-evaluate a nd re-conceprualize a contemporary architectural style that could reconcile both Modernist and Neo-classical contaminarion from rhe Fascist period. Over thc nex t decade. Mario Kdolfi, Adalberto Libera and Luigi Moretti among others, develop ed an urbanistic architectural language that, through the sponsorship of IN,\-Ca sa, the State-subsidized housing authority, succeeded in promoting the developme nt o f a n urban-scale hybrid Modernism combining labour intensive craft-work wi th advanced concrete frame technol~gies.~ The urban fabric in and around Milan w as heavily damaged during the drawn-out allied bombing campaigns. As the country 's major economic centre, reconstruction proceeded quickly. T h e development of the city's regional master-plan, conceived with the participation of the Milane se members of CIAM, went largely unchallenged by the city's traditional planning strategists. The MoveInent. for Architectural Studies (MSA) was founded in Mila n in 1945 with the goal of opposing a traditional academic education. The Lombar d city was already predisposed to developing a Functionalist and Neo-rationalist style of architecture to plug the many damaged sites. Milan's publication house s quickly became the principal platforms for national debates on the future of M odernist architecture. Ernesto Narhan Rogers took over Dornrrs from G i o Ponti in 1946 and then moved over to launch an improved Casabella-Corrtinuit in 1954 ( the magazine remained under his direction until 1967). In 1947 the Milan Trienna le opened its VIII edition featuring the most recent post-war developments in so cial housing and urban reconstruction. Florence would also have its opportunitie s to grab the centre of the debate, but it seems that each occasion was squander ed by internecine quarrels among bitterly competing interests. There are three k cy aspects that when collapsed together help explain the peculiar condition of F lorence's conflictual artistic and architectural culture in the post-war period. The first was the failed reconstruction of Florence's city centre, heavily darn aged during the German wartime withdrawal on 4 August 1944; the second concerned the equally disappointing manner in which the city exthe panded to ~iieet growi ng populatio~iand manufacturing needs in rhe same period; the third was the sign ificance of the student activist lnovements in directly and indirectly contribut ing to reconstituting the School of Architecture into one of the most openly rec eptive - if also least recognized -grounds for architectural
commercial districts abandoned to more ad hoc rebuilding meth-Benedetto Croce, while Leonardo Savioli's more timid
Micheluc-Ricci, did not gain much public support." In Manfredo Tafuri's opinion the ensui ng proposals for the heavily damaged areas "...led to feeble and greatly colnpro mised reconstruction of the
histori-e j o sa[d!su!~d aql 01 Injql!q aq 01 panu!luos uhistori-ert\l a1!qmZsanss! [histori-elnlsal!qsJ e aless-ucq~n pasnsoj blled!supd Bu!u!ema~ aruox uo 'so961 aql q 8 n o ~ qploq s aqxls aqJ .Jaq,oue auo m o ~ ~su!ls!p l j Ll!luap! [eJnlsal!qsJe 10 les!%oloap! alq!Ba[ i([qeuosea~e pamas
-laA!un s!eqsJe pus paleplno aql 1su!e8e sa188n~ls s!da asaqJ
soo!~el!Be pal-luapnls aql uo pr1n~ruo-~~ll~qoso3q~s~ le 8u! u! a u y aql
aql B u ! ~ n ~ ! ~ s u'asmoss!p [eJnl[ns L ~ e ~ o d r u a l u o sq ~ sluaAa os a u! 1ues!j!u8!s lsom aql pu!qaq aJam ue1:Ty pue aruox 'payad JEA\ -]sod a,e!pa rum! aql U :pauasqo !AaZ o u n q .uo!lsnJlsuos pus , I u%!sapBu!p[!nq '8u!uueld ueqm ,sa!l!s aA!lsadsal l!aql u! pa8eBua a ~ o m eSEA\ kqnsej qsea uept\l pue ar uox q o q U dllnsej am1 ~ j I -sal!qsle au!lualols aql j o asueAaIa1aql pampa1 K la~ahas m q 01 a smaas 'asuaJolg j o uo!]snllsuosaJ aql uo 'csuossa[,, ye!lua~od aql j o I n o a8~ama asmoss!p lelnual!qsJe ulapom lusnalal j o pu!y 01 bue l u a ~ a 01d ~ pa~!dsuosl a q l sasuelsmnsl!s j o ]as aBue1ls aqJ ,;a~aqmas[a suo!l! sod ~ olja[ 01 j -ohauaa opleuoa? Kq pamo[[oj ' $ 9 6 ~ ! u o ~ e n o s p o p n ~ ' z 9 6 1 u! o u! e l a q q ollaqlepv auo b q auo puc 's046r ale[ aql Xq eu3o[ og u! luaml~edap 8u!Jaau!8ua aql 01 a[!xa-j[as olu! luam !ssn[aqs!Ty :s~ossajo~d luau!ruo~d sou S j o kuuru so961 a q l j o p o ! ~ a d !I b ~ e a u! lsol asual o[;I ,;,,a~nlsal!qs~e ~I!A\ op 01 Bu!qlou seq s!ql qs!q~\ ssaso~d qBno1ql jlasl! palsn~lsuos-olne...,,Ll!s aql se sJ!ns e -1nd 1es!laJoaql ~ a d a a p - ~ a ~ a slaqssal s,1ooqss aql j o palualel olu! lsom aql Bu!qsnd e p u e l s !p o p l e ~ oue!ls!~3 01 Bu!p~osse' a ~ n l n j o~ s&lp aql m o l j slsal!qsle Bu!pea1 s, asuaJolj j o luawa8eBuas!p PI -01 aql aq p p o m sa!l!unl~oddo pass!m asaql j o u y j a Jau aqJ .ha -qd!~ad8u!puadxa L[p!de~aql j o uo!lsnllsuos pup Bu!uue[d aq l 10 ' a ~ l u a s aql j o uo!lsnllsuosal aql Jaql!a u! aloJ ~eluamnJlsu! ue j o padd!~lspue ap!se paqsnd sayasruaql punoj slsal!qsJe au!luaJ -old ~ u a u ! u o ~Isom aql ' u ~ a l l e d d le!y!mej X[Bu!sea~su!ue amos -aq p[nom leqm U .]uar udola~aplale[ s'i(l!s aql j o qsnm l o j pallns I -uos b [ a ~ e ~ am,%\sIsal!qx e aqJ ,;an[eA [elnlsal!qsJe l u e l ~ o d m ! s,~sa!o~d InsJapun 01 pamaas k[uo 'auoz @!nsnpu! yea[q e m o J j aql ssolse Lpsa~!pK a l l e ~ OUJV aql j o l e o l q l aql le 'a~!saql j o uo!~sal -as paz!ql![od K l a l e u n ~ ~ o j u n 'aue8 ~os aql 'Ll!unmmos mau leap! ue qsle~ss o l j 8u!deqs u! paassns p!p !JJX PUB !I O!AES U a w \ m .sy~ed uaa18 j o luamdola~ap o sa>!hlas alenbape u! I S ~ A l -u ! 01 8u!nsq Inoql!m 'a1nlsal!qsle j o bl!lenb a q l au!mJalap pue sal!s j o as!o qs aql a ~ e u ! u o p01 alqe aJam sJolsai\u! L l ~ a d o ~ d pue [C!~UWU'J ,u!e 8e a s u o .uo!s!~ ysel p[non\ osle Bu!le~luasuos aql mou sem payad em-]sod aql u! q u \ o ~ %a l aql j o qsnm alaqm 'h!s p aql j o scale l e ~ a q d ! ~ a d j o uo!lsnJlsuos pus Bu!uucld aql 'arqA\ aql
bly energetic, with extensive meetings, assemblies, all-night sitmore events and experimental projects." Piero Frassinelli opined: "...Radical architecture is b orn in the occupied university. One lives there and one sleeps there ..." Over t he Ions term, the point may in fact not have been whether the reforms to the uni versity system ever were entirely successful; some reforms were achieved, others never came close.'" T h e students and the faculty engaged in a decade-long ide ological battle over the substance of a contemporary architectural education and this critical discourse undoubtedly succeeded in recasting the fundamental issu es of the Florentine school. The prolonged struggle for educational reform is to be credited with furnishing the powerful rhetorical ammunition exploited so pro ficiently by the Superarcbiterlure generation. And then of course there is the h istorically rich city of Florence, whose entire economy functioned outside of ma jor industries like Milan or the huge bureaucracies like Rome. Florence was prim arily an artisan-manufacturing centre with a very powerful shopkeeper middleclas s. Students attending the School of Architecture in Florence in the 1960s had a much harder time finding work, o r getting swept into working class struggles, o r protesting national policies. Without the distractions of the big city setting , students moved in smaller circles: but one event in 1966 would act to pull the \\thole architectural community together
Kaprow, the sound artists from l3uxus." But in less than a flash, the past, now buried deep under metres of mud and debris. Scenes ments of artifacts from the r iver? sediment and painstakingly handling them like birds caught in an oil slick were emotionally stirring, but ultimately a setback to the cause. The planning for the first Superarcl~irecrr~re exhibition in
Pis-the Arno valley as an enormous lake.
dle class were incapable of seeing beyond the city's customary traditions. With all the talented artisans and small manufacturing in a state of existence that w as neither reliably authentic nor confurniture and leather luxury goods for the upper classes. Alessandro Mendini's land of "Good design" could be almost anywhe re
42
If in fact Florence was hopelessly blocked by traditional conventions, the city' s artistic community had been taking important steps towards building a receptiv e place for an alternative contemporary art culture. Florentines were gradually becoming acquainted with the most important players on the European art circuit. Maria Gloria Bicocchi's gallery Centrodiffusionegrafica on Piazza Saltarelli (l ater to become a d t a p e s 22, the pre-eminent video centre featuring the like s of Bill Viola) was one of the first galleries to bring internationally acclaim ed artists like Robert Rauschenberg and Andy Warhol, performance artists like Al lan
tions threw the two events out of sequence. There would be little time for Archi zoom and sUPER5'TUD10 to evolve between the two
sentative medium itself, as it does from their subversive message. SUPERSTUD~O f rom beginning to end stripped architecture down to i n most essential meaning. S UI'ERSTUDIO requires additional levels of reading, precisely because there are d egrees of deception constantly present in their elaborately assembled images and projects. Their highly seductive and visually pleasing visions tend to veil a b iting critique collaged just below the surface. Each stage of their work is mean t to eel back another layer of social paralysis, of futile dreams and debilitati ng social infrastructures. SUPERSTUDIOworked from positions of deep familiarity, destabilizing from within each and every aspect of the architectural discourse. Florence, as one of the most significant artistic destinations o n the 19th-cen tury Grand Tour, finds itself transported in the work of SUPERSTUDIOinto a dimen sion of science fiction, history's other." Twelve Carrtionary Talesfor Christmas : Pren~o,ti!io~ts the M)~stical of Rebirth of Urbanism, apart from its anti-utop ian visions and very personal form of inquisitiveness, refuses to celebrate the role of architecture and urban design in the construction of city lile.'" The ex quisitely drafted sections, axonometrics and illustrations depicting the twelve cities reassure the
trolled and modified. This is what Adolfo Natalini referred to as "theory +
practice +
theory check", that ran into all sorts of
This may well have been an inevitable outcome for a research project that began with the typological ordering of architectural monuments, images and ambient tec hnology; and gradually spread farenough out to bring into its orbit a world of o bjects and buildings, of monuments and landscapes, until nothing remained unduti fully maintained touched by its reductive powers. SUPERSTUDIO
Piero Frassinelli, seem in the end to be much closer to a critique o n the prese nt than evocations for the future: the twelve scenes unfold like exaggerated pro jections on some of o u r most common obsessions, where consumer culture goes bl ind, bureaucracies go mindless, high-technology pacifies. This may also be inter preted as a critique of Americanization, a rising hen omen on in the contemporar y Italian scene. The suggestive subtitle, "SUPERSTUDIO evoke nvelve visions of i deal cities, the supreme achirvement of twenty thousand years of civilization, b lood sweat and tears. The Final Heaven of Man in possession of Truth, free from contradiction, equivocation and indecision; totally and forever replete with his own PERFECTION ...", implies just such a world specially made for you, with no need to do anything except to find the button. The project was not really about anti-utopias, but was SUPERSTUDIO'S stark premonition on where contemporary tren ds were leading. office had schizoFrom 1966 to 1973 the SUPERSTUD~O phrenically advanced by pursuing o n one hand pragmatic and successlul furniture designs, tr ain cars, residential and commercial buildings (the group could count o n the in dustrial design experience of Roberto Magris), and on the other by progressively dissecting those very same projects to reduce the variations, to streamline the waste, to eliminate all clutter. The process devel4s oped into a series of chec ks and balances, whereby the theory
en-us want to change ... but also allow en-us to retreat back to the con,. fort of our real homes, our heavy objects, our annoying lives. But from 1973 on, coinciding with Adolfo Natalinii teaching appointment at the School of Architecture in Flo rence, the group moved in hvo different directions. It was a moment of deep reas sessment. The individual members began working more independently on different t ypes of projects, but also moved into the academic research and teaching. Natali ni's class, taught with the assistance of Alessandro Poli, Cristiano Toraldo di
Francia and Piero Frassinelli, investigated the everyday use of objects in conte mporary culture. Under the title of Ex~ra-Urban Ma~erralCukure, students were as ked to return to their local family origins, and help anthropologically document the material culture slowly disappearing in the countryside. Natalini's famed l ectures on the walking stick -he boasts a large collection of handmade and
manu-48
The course in effect initiated a second phase in the SUPERSTUDIO oeuvre; whereby there is a concerted attempt ro find a way to reconstruct the bare elements of a new architecture. T h e anthropological research on primitive Italian peosanr culruse, its tools and shelters, was one of the few projects of its kind going o n during these years. Considcring the massive scale of the fami exodus into the 1960s, the real risk, that has since proved founded, was the permanent loss of a highly sustainable lowgrade human ecology. E s t ~ < r - U r b o1'4oter;ol C ~ ~ l t r ibears little re,~ re semblance to the fanfare and hoopla created around the 1973 Global Tools symposium, which remaincd transfixed by consumer culture. SUPERSTUDIOinitiated Histog~a171s, back in 1969, with the intention of reducing design and architecture to a single threedimensional manipulation of surfaces. When SUPERSTUDIO began its study on the design of silnple multi-functional utens ils in 1973, it w:~snot to design a better and more marketable product bur to de find proven l ~ w - ~ r a technologies that were uniquely versatile. The peasan t farmer Zeno, in his native home in Tuscany, rebuilt a bent-wood chair from the turn of the century, piecc by piece, over the course of about fifty years. Ever y reiteration presenled the chair's proportions and function, though each time t hc artifact was slightly modified. The goal of the research was to documenr and le:~rnfrom these extraordinary human experiences; but this phase of SUIJEI(STUDI ~'S research lacked the checks, balances and earlier ironies that might have suc cessfully lifted this project back on to a more international platform. A broad overvie\\, of the project including many examples drawn from tlie student resear ch was later mounted at the 1978 Venice Biennale to exhibit the category of Arch itecture, under the title of l'roject Ze11o. This strangely Heideggerian vision of the new world, a familiar revisiting of van Gogh's contemplation on a pair of peasant shoes, suggests a project that nonetheless reconnects with the r e c l ~ r of architecture. t~ SUI'ERSTUDIO also presented The WiJe o J L o t , consist ing of a welded iron table and moving tower designed to hold a fluid pouch fille d with water. A tube dripped water over five salt nloulds representing the histo rical stages of architecture: the pyrsmid, the coliseum, the basilica, Versaille s and the Villa Savoye. With time, as in fact was the case, each of the salt mou lds disappeared, a demonstration on archirecture's inevitable dissolution. This project more than anything else physically embodied the dilemma of ;~rchitecture 'sephemeral existence, \vith the additional tension (hat such a delicately frame d iron and s;llt structure produces by sitting at the edge of Venice's Grand Can al. The artifact has since been lost, but its idea lives on as the anti-monument dedicatcd to the mother of all monuments. The strange combination of profession al practice and theoretical insurrectionism; of profitable industry contracts an d sarcastic
I
assaults on consumerism; of global fame and peasant culture, are the conflictual relationships in a body of research committed to engaging mainstream society. T hc members of S U I ~ E R S T U D ~ ~ have sought t~ discover the way towards ma king a better society, made up of individu:~lsresponsible to their communities, critically cog. nizant of their natural resources and shared cultures. The funda mental issues from the group's early beginnings Xrcere all directed towards a c r ~ t i q i ofea hegemonic modernization: N ~ . ~
If the architect cannot become architecture, is there anything left but to take one's leave of the stage?
' P Ginsbow, ,I Hirtnn $ Corilc~,~pomn lia(i8 (Lon. rlon:l'cn~tlinhoks, 1990.
' D . Gi;~che~ri, SCI. ,l,ini
bby". In 'The ~ L l o ~ r OrJirlnr.nl: IY1c.inirr &*!)a, ~rtlnsl. Thonl:>s Y L c r i n (Ca~nbridpc,Mnsr.: t l n r
-and minorron~lccrionrbc. ' Ilornc war bombitrdcd I" ~\r,eenthcm, bo, rhcr were m d ;trotand #hc st;,. onlike Archiroom. who 11on ; ~ n d y;trds. mainly (corn he beginnin): e ~ l r ~ c ddrnluging t h e a . o r h p d;~u ns s right and Iamncli ar r c ~ i d c ~ ~ ~ i i l l Of San distTiCI group of fricndr or cohonr. L ~ ~ ~ ~ , ~ ~ . " According ro Irl.lrca L ,-fie,,,.een Grirpigni, sutdcnr> rcvolr. Co nrinuilgnnd Crisis: t l i s r d bec;>oscthes were con- w r y md I'rojecc in L ~ l i ; ~ ~ rciously ;~s..trct h ~ soclcly r ArchlrccrurJ CUI,,,~~ ,Ilc in \vould nor be sblc ro proPO~CU,~~ period.., 2~ (no, ridcthcm\\,i~h workur rhc 15. B ; ~ C I ~ 2000.7). ~J,
.
1970 imld 19721, h u I~ I ~ I L rrsctlich n.as oor get porriblc l a d o in l he school. l'eIcr Lang. inlcrrir\v x i t h hlc5smdro Poli Iflorcncc, Deccmher 20021 .
~ r i o n e poliric;~ violenrn. , c 1 '6R a I < O ~ ~ "in A. 1 , M.
(;rispigni.
"GLWC~. (venice. ~ I . , C ~ , I , ~ .
Agarti. L. P;>,serln~ N. ,md Tr~tnfi~glin, lri ' i r 1 r ; ~ m edh. e i ba b Jd '68 (Milan: rg r
,', so lirrle hiSroric ccnrre. in Lcr, bc con. can 194-951.
1999.
this ii.a trivis~l obrema~ion
denrr from a v;tri region from RcFSioCmilie. Genoa and thc South. ar well as r " Fontan2 (cit. 1951, '' IM. T;lfuri, H,rtnn,o/l/nl. largcnumbcrof fore~jin rnlim r Arrbiiecl,,rc, 1944dcncn O f the porriblc iuc198.7, rirnrl.JerricaLcvinc tors thsc lily behind Fla~nce'r growing ppulnriry. (Cin,brdFe. M~rr.: Thc \r.nr orld admission by btlr Press. 1990. 71. "hlin~orc Fanfmi \\,as ~ h e rhe school's prc ridenr. national-levcl policicisn Con.t h a ~ city hsd l e s the who sough[ f:~t ,o~rsv i ~ b reridcnrisl Iproblcmr than \ rhc \lorking cli~rrcs, thcrc- rhe olhc r grca,er merropoby focu,ing his or~cntionr lirer and bccnure rhc !pro. fessorr wcrc n,ore iaccorion \\,orking cl;er districts blc having I n r professionto beg in w i ~ h accord But ;,I ,vork l o rlirrrncr rhcn?. ingtoCrirri;lnoToraldodi An d here \\.as ,~l\vayso f Franci;,, the destiny ofFlo. rcncr war and remains coun erhecirs'r;inirric h c r Nt~:tone.R o m ~ c c , locked i n the hitndr of rhe itn gr IL? 7 Dcccmbcr 19661. rhopkeepcrr. n,ho nrc on. " "In his iwopural lerrurc \v illing lo alloiv erperifor the new year, rc\,enlml: mentarion inro the cir?. 1%. rei L%!ng, interview with ,hat rhere w r n lack of
ns to upen tire thesis projcrts i o a \r,ider rnnjie of topics. Pirzoilo and Di
Crirtina. i n Gmhrllir-Co,i!i,ri,iId Ino. 287. Milan. lvlily 196-1.391 '' Tornld o di Frzlncin m w rhc fight to do arvay with lhc expensive nmdclr us a sign rhnr much tnorc had to ch;nnae: their demands were to opco the univeoicy ryrrcm co~? .er)~one.from nII social clurrer.\vi~hrnsrr ;ecnrible toercr)nne.such ,\r i n f s c ~rhc cost o f [he proferrionally m ~ d e tmodelr for thc (hesir proiecl. T h n e \>.ere [he issuer [hat pro\,oked them to occupy the rec~or'r office on Plap Z San Marco in 1964. ami~h I srbour lifly othcr students
p h r . Dcripns b y Arch!. zoom and Supciscudio". M Filer (no. 47. London, 20021 . Aho see M . Capo. biunco. " G l i Anni Qui~rnnvn', i n M . Cnpobianco and C. C ilrreri. cdr. Ar. chirct~ami~rliilrrn: 191019.79 IN;~pler: Elecra Napoli. 1998. 1221, 'I. E. Cnrre". 'lnccrvirra ia BrunoZNi". 1991. inS0pee
our dirporitlon reparore inridenccthen, ~l>elirrrSt,and i ~ ~ ~ d e ~ u ~ ~ c e r .ara c lp e r n r c l ~ d c c l : ~ r ~ r h o ~ ~ ~ i n P i ~ ~ p s.. iiir n s r nor a prccire oblip- toia fc;lrured ciwdboard ittian roproviderhcmu;~nr and ~ n~r.bn:trd n r ~ n l h i arhich (he univcrriiy and ~ions.l'ctcrLnnp,inrcn~iew th crchool ingcnectl nccd, with C r ~ t h n o o r ~ l d o T di ilndrhitr iiirno~the precire Francid (Filortmno. 7 Deresponribiliry ofthe domi. cember 20021. nant po liticxl class to have ' C a p o n e ~ r o Fmcnrriinnd lcfr the Iralian r c h w l ryr- ni, i n G ~ n h c l i u . C o , ~ ~ i , > ~ , i ~ ~ i (no.287.Milnn.May 19 W. ~ r m such abandon and in misery". "Diwomo agli 5,". 401.
i n Romc. During the nr~cmblies[hey refused ro veuk bur chirped inrrei~d perrhcd on [he bcnchcr likes raosring birds. See Grispigni k i t . 3MI. '" "In 1968 rhe Iralii~n Schools of Archilecturc
be-" Umnir. 0 yello\v bound meekly news-stand publi-and more could bc developed on each o i r h e indi. war quite
c.lrian from Mondndari, v i d u ~ lmcmberr of the i ~ m u n d group. h4.znyof rh ere godr rhe Florrntinc Radical were rhated. and it \\,auld cros-d. Scicnce Ficr ion be imporrant ro go deeper works ar o son o f alterna- into su~cns-ruoro's gr oup tn.c or escapist li~eri~rure dynamic.
of chc Florcnce School of hrchi~ecrurcwns published i n the Florentine daily in Decembcroil966. Thesrliclc ourlined rhe tcnuour condicionr t?dngthe rchod after che flwd, becoming a sonofwish lirr for the then ~ r Preside G i ~ i r c ~G oe i who lpropored n new rh;lr a,ould relocatc rhe school inro (he pcriphcry running along the fwrhills on the RorcnccPni+l'ir. toia ilxir, LO deal with thc wpid 1r ,p6n~oftheschwl'r populationduringthep~c. war pcriod (500rrudcnrs ln 1958 to 150 0 in 19661. According l o ~ h address by c SO Gori, Florence drew
xu-"V.Grc~otti." R c o l t i dcl corrruire". Crahell<r-Cot,,rriirird (no. 287. Mila n. M;>y 19M. 191. "In inrcn,iewrwith rcvcrnl members of Archimam and SUPERYTUDIO ,hlaric Therer Stauffcr laced Dranzi, Corrctti. Dcg;ulello, and Tonddo d i Frenc i;~as part of the group 111;tr occupicd the rector's office. See Slauffcr (cil. 35, foornore 37). " On the agenda were r l o dcnrs' demilndr to reeon. r,irucc t hc existing power structures within (he oni. verri~y,to include rhe participstio n ofrhcrmdentrin ar~demlc decirionr.;~r $vcll
versity in 1963 ond 1901. Bur they were prerenr e.ar. licr ;m reaching arrir~ant r. :' Toraldo d i France recalled that Ricri'r course had rhc r~udcntr work on f tlll-rcnlc models, a conrmverriril .tppro;tcb jii\,cn thc rchool'r pcnchsln~for precise ink drmingr. Perer Lang, inrcrvicw wirh Crirr h n o Toraldo d i Franch ( Filottrnno, 7 Decembcr 20021. '' Leonardo Ricci, "Prab. lemi per una nuovn maggi or~nza",lecturc held nr thc FncoltB d i Firenzc i n orrarian ofthe faculry confc rence held i n Romc hc. t\\,een I 4 and 15 M ~ r c h 19M. Rq,nn,cd in
C~rcrbel-visionary drawings coming from the studios of young Florentines from 1966 on wer e an altogether different level of creation, image making and thought than mere product design. The drawings of SUPESTUDIO,Archizoom, UFO, Gruppo Strum, Gianni Pettena, Ugo La Pietra and others were, as Doug Michaels puts it, "kick ass desi gn" but more importantly they were "creative initiatives", unlike anything being ~ r o d u c e din America at the time.' They suggested a fantastic architectura l scene in Florence that made California seem very provincial and unimaginative. In today's \\.orld where architectural shifts and drifts are internationalized cquickly across cyberspace, it is hard to imagine a small museum city like Flore nce as a centre of international thought on architecture, urbanism and design. T his small Tuscan city, as Peter Cook reminds us, is "a safe distance from Cape C anaverd, the galleries of New York and Dusseldorf, and even the snlelly factorie s of the P o valleyMand "there [is] hardly an insistent or threatening local mil ieu of mainstream architects worth bothering about".' The arch scenes of Rome, V enice and Milan were vibrant in their own ways, but this small museum and univer sity city was very much a hot spot in the late 1960s. It had an architecture cul ture that revolved around one of Italy's most lively and politically engaged arc hitecture schools, the best art and architecture book store in Italy Centro Di a nd Maria Gloria Bicocchi's out front gallery Centrodiffusionegrafica (later to b ecome the important video tape gnllery art/tapes 22): Throughout the 1960s the s eductively ironic and charged polemics of these Florentine architects were known in North h l e r ica through Italian magazines but SUPERSTUDIO did touch down i n the United States at the Rhode Island School of Design for a moment in 1970. I ts "strategist" Adolfo Natalini taught there for a semester with Archigrammer Mi ke Webb, and Austrians Raimund Abraham and Friedrich St Florian.' This connectio n with the world outside Italy changed dramatically in 1972 when the Museum of M odern Art in New York under the direction of design curator Emilio Ambasz create d an amazing exhibition and spectacularly beautiful catalogue titled Italy: The New Dornertic
ÿÿ be Webb Ratmund Abraham ~dollo Narallni and Frledr ch St Florran 1970
stage for its penultimate moment on the international scene." It was the first t o feature the young Florentines and none of the other visionary architectural dr aftsmen of the period: Cedric Price, Archigram o r the Austrians: Coop Himmelbla u, Haus.Rucker-Co,
The exhibition and catalogue attempt to rectify this understand-54
Landscape, Achievetnet~tsand I'roblems ofltalia~rDe.sig~z.~ The largest and most expensive exhibition in the history of MOMA, featured alongside a survey of con temporary Italian init dustrial and doniestic product design a SUPERSTUD~O Mimoc vent/Microcrrvirontnetrt as well as projects by Archizoom, Ugo La Pietra. Gruppo Strum, group 9999 and others.' It should be noted that during this period MOMA' S architecture department truly had its finger on the ~ u l s of the moment. The Architecture and e Design Department under Arthur Drexler created other importa nt exhibits: Visiotra~~' Arch~tectrrre(1960). Architecture IVitbout architect^ ( 1965) and just before Neru Dotne.rtic Landscape,
Edu-sign culture.
Thc Ncw Domestic Lndscape catalogue begins with a short discussion on domesticat ion from Antoine d e Saint-Exupbry's Thl,r Little Pri~~ce:
"You become responsible, forever, for what you have domesticated." "What does th at mean - domesticated?" "It is an act too often neglected. It means to establis h bonds."
...
"I want to, very much", the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and ;I great many things to understand." "One only und erstands tlie things that one domesticates", said tlie fox. "Men have no more ti me to understand anything. They buy things already made ar shops. But there is n o shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so \ve have no friends any mor e. If you want a friend, domesticate me ..." "What must 1 do, to domesticate you ?" asked rhe little prince. "...One must observe the proper rites ..." "What is a rite?" asked the little prince. "Those are ;icrions too often neglectedn, said the fox. "They re what make one day different from other days, one hour from ot her hours."" This call for design is quickly followed in the introduction with t he disclaimer thar "design cannot solve all problems that precede its crearion a nd rhose that may arise f r o ~ nir"." If this were not cnough of a qualifier, A mbasz then proclaims the irrelevance of objects: "for many designers, the aesthe tic quality of individual objects intended for private consumption [has] become irrelevant in the face of such pressing problems as poverty, urban decay, and th e pollution of tlie environmenr now cncounrered in all industrialized countries" ." Furthermore, soriie of these designers "despairing of effecring social change through design, regard their task as essentially a political one and therefore absrain from physical design of either objects or environments and channel their energies into the sraging of evcnrs and the issuing of polemical statements".'" These absraining designers, in rhe spirit of polemical discourse, are given a c hapter in the caralogue ro stare their position and critique those with whom the y disagree about the production of objects. The catalogue essay by Manfredo Tafu ri, for and example, attacks the work of sLJ~olU'l'L!~10 Archizoom for bcing "li beration through irony [that] goes over the same ground covered by rlie utopias of the avant-garde of earlier years"." When
in society"." They do not "invent substantially new forms, instead they engage i n a rhetorical operation of redesigning conventional objects with new ironic, ; ~ n d sometimes self-deprecatory
socio-tradictions and paradoxes of the firsr two groups. In thc first ten-litical and philosophical action or complere \virhdrawal from the
mean here designed environments like T o ~ oF I ~ U I I S / J ~~ I I~ l U , by I modular housing industry. T h e history of modular housing is er "conceive[sl of work as an autonomous acrivity responsibleonly to itself and does not question irs sociocultural context", simply refining "already established forms and f~nct ions".:~ secThe ond group o r rhe reformists. itre "morivated by a ~ r o f o u n dconcern for the designer's role in a society that fosters consumption as one m ciins of inducing individual happiness, thereby insuring
most co~ilpellingapproach since it "corresponds to the preoccupations of a chang ing society", and is what "rhe exhibition is
DIO
created a nine-panel project that arguably stands out as the iconic project from the exhibit. The division of Italian design into three prevalent attitudes is f ollowed in the catalogue by the two sections "Objects" and "Environments" that p arallel and document the exhibition. The
cat-for their implications of more flexible patterns of use and
arrange-to completely different categories. In "Objects" designs are seand finally "impl ications of more flexible patterns of use and arrangement"."These definitions se em flexible and loose because urn. It is a domestic product that appears in many Italian design
concerns and their professional practices" can be placed togethwhich they work". " In the first "Objects" grouping selected for their formal and technical means are domestic designs by Joe Colombo, Vico Magistretti, Gaetano Pesce, Marco Zanu so and Richard Sapper's early television boxes, Ettore Sottsass' classic Valenti ne portable Olivetti typewriter, the Castiglioni brothers' lamps. Massimo Vi-see much difference in concept beyond their marketing.
Italian conundrum and needs an explanation. Adolfo Natalini commenting on Italia n architects involved in this sector has said, "its super production of ideas is due to the condition of complete unemployment among architects. In the Florence School OF Architecture, there are 6,000 students, and architects in Italy are i n charge OF only 25% of the total built volume of building. The soFirms with mor e than 500 called 'Furniture industryyhas only t \ \ , ~ employees in more than 28,000 Firms (average number of employccs 4.8) and can thercfore, thanks to its 'craftsmen' size. allo\\' itself an ample margin of little experiments"." While SUI'ERSI.UD~O did believe For a titile that the luxury goods market, created by an extant artisanal Italian economy, offered them the opportunity to express des ign ideas that were closed off to them in the building sector, they evcntually c anie to believe it was a deadend street. It \\,as, thcy decided, little more tha n an "inducement to COLISUII~C".I" In thc second section of the exhibition "Envi ronments" Arnbasz presents a detailed, maniFesto-like seven-page Design Program of "environmental concepts" that he hoped would become physical designs." The De sign Progra~~r includes minutely detailed programmatic considerations and option s that include cost goals (economically available to "low to middle income Itali an Families"), exhibition light sources, a list OF "general considerations" and a final separate essay, "Manhattan: Capital of the Twentieth Century" that all a ttempt to put contemporary problems OF the domcstic landscape in context for the designers." It is liberally sprinr kled with quotes From Siegfried Giedion's T1 1e A r c l ~ i f e c t f ~o fe Transition, Henri LeFebvre's The Explosio12,Marxi sm and the Fre11c11 Upheaval, Ambasz's Princeton professor Abraham A. Moles and Environnrer~!." The Manhattan text, Howard Searles' N O I I . H Z I I I I ~ I I informed by W:ilter Benjamin insights, presents the island as an infrastructure that provides the Framework in which "all crystallized fragments rescued from th e city ofmemory, and all the Fragments envisioned For the city OF tlie imaginati on may dwell together in an ensemble, if not by reason of thcir casual or histor ical relationships (since no reconstruction is hereby intended), then by grace O F their aBinities"." This essay originally published in Casabrlla seems gratuito us and his call that it inspire designers to "make incursions into i~iiaginaryre alms" is hardly necessary For groups like suPmsruuro."Based on chis detailed Des ign Progra~n each invited designer or group is asked to design "a domestic envir onment adaptable enough to permit the enactment OF different private and communa lly imagined new events.. . sufficiently fixed to permit the re-enactment OF ... constant aspects OF our individual and social memory"." In tlie Desig~rProgram Ambasz presents his view that the probso lems of urban society are so severe tha t designers must be
chal-anti-utopias are scvcrely criticized in the most po\verful text in The ri's preferred standards OF earlier avant-gardes, sincc they risk
