Aldo Rossi’s Città Analoga: Legend of a legend
Lecture of Jean-Pierre Chupin, Professor, Chair of Laboratoire d’étude de l’architecture potentielle (Université de Montréal), in the context of the lecture series “We built this city” at the Institute for Art and Architecture Summerterm 2009.
Acurious character haunts certain of Aldo Rossi’s drawings: a sketchedfigure, dark or clothed in black. He stands before a window againstthe sunlight, in a bare room dimly lit by a lamp suspended from theceiling. In the foreground, a bottle of wine and a piece of fruit siton a table. There is an ambiguity to his gaze: does he look throughthe window to the world beyond, or does he stare at the frame of thewindow itself?
This obscure character figures prominently inthe composition entitled Città Analoga, first presented at the 1976Venice Biennale. The image, and by extension, the idea of theAnalogical City that it embodies, is central to an ongoing reflectiontaken up by Rossi at the end of the 60s, recurring throughout the 70s,and brutally interrupted in the early 80s. By focusing on anexamination of the Città Analoga, this lecture hopes to contribute to ahistorical and theoretical sitting of Rossi’s theory of the analogicalimagination of the city.
Jean-Pierre Chupin is an architecture graduate from Nantes (France),and Portsmouth (UK). He has a Masters in History and Theory ofArchitecture from McGill University and a PhD from the Université deMontréal. He taught at the Université du Québec in Montreal, ToulouseSchool of Architecture and Lyon School of Architecture before joiningthe Université de Montréal. He is the co-founder and scientificdirector of the Laboratoire d’Étude de l’Architecture Potentielle ( www.leap.umontreal.ca ), and heads up the design and updating work on the Canadian Competitions Catalogue ( www.ccc.umontreal.ca ) and the European Competitions Database ( www.arclab.umontreal.ca/EUROPAN-FR ).
Moregenerally, his research work focuses on knowledge by analogy inarchitecture (history, theory, practice and teaching) and on tectonics.Alongside Cyrille Simonnet and Kenneth Frampton, he has published Leprojet tectonique (InFolio, Golion, 2005). He is currently completing awork on the analogy spectrum in architecture which will appear underthe title Analogies, matière d’architecture, in the collection Projetet Théorie which he is co-directing with Paolo Amaldi (InFolio, 2009).
Further lectures in this series
27.04.2009 | 19:00h | R211a
Jeremy Foster
Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture, Cornell University
Urban entropy and socio-natural temporalities in post-apartheid Johannesburg
18.05.2009 | 19:00h | R211a
ppag architects
Architects, Vienna
WE BUILD THIS CITY… YES, IT'S US (ALL) !
08.06.2009 | 19:00h | R211a
Valéry Didelon
Architecture Theorist, Paris
About the Lecture Series:
WE BUILT THIS CITY…
Architects build Cities, how?
Can we reduce the city as simply a collection of buildings, or do we need to distinguish between architecture and urbanism?
How can we ignore one if we are conceiving the other?
Isthe city a system of buildings or is it a complex system, which allowsfor buildings to be arranged in an orderly or chaotic manner?
Some cities are more desirable to live in than others, why?
Some cities are more expensive t han others, why? | Some cities are easier to get around, why?
Some cities are models for others, why?
Some cities are greener than others, why?
Some cities are dormitories, why?
Some cities are struggling with their glorious past, why?
Some cities are grounds for experiments, why?
Some cities are divided by war, why?
Some cities are automobile cities, why?
Some cities are exploited by politics, why?
Some cities are more public than others, why?
Some cities are…
Thelecture series 08/09 will explore the question of urbanity, and whatmakes the city of the 21st century a ground for another urbanism: Wewill debate the future possibilities of the metropolis. If Manhattanwas the model of a retroactive manifesto, what could be the future ofour urban living? And who is to build it?