Histories of Postwar Architecture

“La Cava. International outdoor show of plastic arts”. Exhibiting Art and Architecture in Monterinaldi, 1955

Stefano Setti — 2023-10-30

“La Cava. International outdoor show of plastic arts” was an exhibition hosted at Leonardo Ricci’s studio-house in Monterinaldi in 1955 by the gallerist Fiamma Vigo and Ricci himself. According to the organizers, this event advocates of the search for a communion between the arts with architecture by presenting itself as an isolated experience within the Italian art scene. The aim of this in-depth study is to consider how this initiative was one of a kind by framing it within a larger context in order to understand the specific declination of the concept of the “synthesis of the arts” given by the organizers, the role of the studio-house architecture as a specific display device as well as the role of certain sculptures in relation to their placement within the villa.

Not Existentialist, but Existential. Leonardo Ricci and the Philosophical thought of Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus and Enzo Paci

Maria Clara Ghia — 2023-10-30

Was Ricci actually an ‘existentialist architect’? And if so, was he existentialist ‘in the manner of whom’? Was his thinking influenced by the phenomenological approach? And in particular, how and why his research dealt with the key theme of the ‘architectural form’?

This essay focuses specifically on Ricci’s theoretical attitude, with the aim to contextualize it in its contemporary philosophical currents. His writings are compared with some of the most important texts of French existentialism, that influenced him during his stay in Paris in the early fifties, in particular those of Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, especially focusing on his idea of ‘the absurd’. In addition, a particular consideration is given to the affinities between the thought of Ricci and that of Enzo Paci, the Italian philosopher who, perhaps more than any other at that moment, dealt with the themes of architecture in his articles published on the magazine Casabella-Continuità: Paci’s ‘positive existentialism’ develops concepts such as ‘relationality of experience’, ‘permanence and emergence of forms’ and considers architecture as a ‘relational field’ continuously mutable in a temporal evolvement. Those ideas are particularly relevant if confronted with Ricci’s way of looking at the architectural form as a consequence of the ‘potential for vitality’ inherent within the object designed, that should respond to the basic needs, or acts, of the users, which must be re-examined case by case to understand the ‘existential’ reasons of the project.

The analysis of those theoretic themes, if considered in addition to the exceptional results of Ricci’s architectural practice, seem to give other compelling grounds for his reinstatement as a central figure in the architectural context after Second World War, and precisely in the present moment, when a re-foundation of the architectural discipline is needed as a consequence of environmental and social urgency.

Leonardo Ricci and Umberto Eco. The Merging of Parallel Visions on the Scientificity and Openness of Experience in the “Ricci-Eco Motion”

Ilaria Cattabriga — 2023-10-30

Leonardo Ricci and Umberto Eco’s collaboration at the Faculty of Architecture in Florence in the Sixties brought to the end of the student revolt in 1968 and to the publication of Eco’s La Struttura Assente. La ricerca semiotica e il metodo strutturale (1968). Eco dedicated the book, firstly titled Appunti per una semiologia delle comunicazioni visive, to Ricci, it was released in 1968 and immediatly entered the heart of the debate on Structuralism - the theory that most dominated the cultural climate of those years and that seemed to deliver the sense, the knowledge, and a cultural new destiny to the specificities of history.
More in detail, Ricci’s idea of “open work” in architecture is analyzed. The concept of “open work” was firstly forged by Eco in his text “Il problema dell’opera aperta” (1958) published in the second part of the collection of essays La Definizione dell’Arte. Dall’estetica medievale alle avanguardie, dall’opera aperta alla morte dell’arte titled “Il concetto di forma nelle poetiche contemporanee” which encompassed Eco’s writings about Art, Music, Photography, Aesthetics, and Theater and led to the completion of his Opera Aperta in 1962.
The purpose of this text is to explain, by means of a direct comparison between Ricci and Eco’s thinking on each analyzed aspect, to what extent Visual Design, and Urban Design, even to a minor degree, constituted the connection between Ricci and Eco’s work, the core of their collaboration at the Faculty of Architecture in Florence, that showed a main affinity in the “Open Work” derived from the concept of “Open Formativity” firstly theorized by Benedetto Croce and then by Eco’s master Luigi Pareyson.

Leonardo Ricci. Model + Structure + Form. Recorded Lectures and Seminars with Students in Venezia, Italia, 1994

Keith Plymale — 2023-10-30

The proposed paper will be the first publication from a seminar series given by Leonardo Ricci to his American students from his home in Venice, Italy. The text will be an annotated transcript drawn from 14 weekly meetings that were recorded at Ricci’s living room table between January and April 1994. Topics discussed by Ricci and his students range from architectural theory to analysis of specific buildings, and include Mies van der Rohe, Louis Kahn, Carlo Scarpa, Le Corbusier, Giovanni Michelucci, Alvar Aalto, and other architects. Ricci also discusses architectural education and his own buildings and paintings. As one of Ricci’s former students, then his co-teacher in Venice, Ricci asked me to record these meetings for future transcription and publication. This paper, entitled Model, Structure, Form, will be the first installment for a book of annotated transcripts from the full 20 hours of recordings, accompanied by the unedited audio recordings of Ricci speaking, drawing, and answering questions during each seminar.
“Making plans on the Grand Canal is utopian, almost as though the topos did not exist. Even if, once, it was possible, one wonders how a modern building could coexist with one from the past. Thus I found myself in the world of artistic creation. It was as though I were the owner of the ruins which had become the house-museum, thanks to Peggy Guggenheim, and the mayor of Venice was ready to sign the construction permit. For many sleepless nights I saw the already constructed Ca’ Venier, all of it, on the Grand Canal. A magic box. Platforms suspended in space suitable for single works. Pollock suspended in the void. Klee in precious urns. Giacometti projected into the sky. The exterior like Ca’ D’Oro made of marble and white stone. The interior of slate to absorb the light and leave it alone with the colors of the paintings and sculptures. But anyone who knows how to read can read the drawings and the plastic. Even the uninitiated can.”

Leonardo Ricci, La Biennale di Venezia, 1994

“Logbooks” (1938-1963)

Ilaria Cattabriga — 2023-10-30

This contribution wants to introduce one of the most important archival sources currently kept in Casa Studio Ricci: the so-called “Logbooks”, a collection of six journals composed by Leonardo Ricci’s first wife, Angela Poggi. They cover a time span from 1938 to 1963 and give evidence of a quite complete overview on Ricci’s work. The heterogeneous materials were digitalized and made available for further research.

Leonardo Ricci and Leonardo Savioli. An Epistolary Novel. 1943-1944

Lorenzo Mingardi — 2023-10-30

Through unpublished letters written by Leonardo Ricci to his friend Leonardo Savioli in 1943 and 1944, the paper aims to trace the early period of the two architects' careers. The documents allow us to understand how the themes Ricci developed in both architecture and painting from the 1950s onward, and more fully in the 1960s, are present in his thinking as an artist and homme des lettres already from the years just prior to the projects for the reconstruction of the center of Florence. Moreover, the contribution highlights how Ricci also began, like Savioli, to design an imaginative “Ideal City” as early as 1943. His subsequent plans for new city pieces and his quest for the Integrated City are indebted to the feelings, aspirations and nightmares he experienced during the years of World War II.

Leonardo Ricci and Florence (1936-1989)

Ilaria Cattabriga — 2023-10-30

The paper wants to be an overview on the work of Leonardo Ricci in his town, Florence, by depicting a complete frame about his activity as a painter, architect, scenographer and about his relationship with Florence and with his projects in the different phases of his life.
The chronological span, from 1936 to 1989, was chosen in function of the available archival resources. The list of Ricci’s work is therefore enriched by his drawings that best explain his experimentation through different representative methods and languages, able to convey the projects’ strength.
The pictures of the drawings’s choice was also driven by the intention to integrate the iconographic material already published in HPA issue no. 9, Leonardo Ricci (1918-1994) - Archives I, which collects a plenty of unknown graphic documents, especially in the archival records sections.

The Function of Art in Contemporary Life (1952)

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

Form, the Tangible Expression of a Reality (1966)

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

Kiesler, the Florentine School and the Curving of the World (1966)

Marco Dezzi Bardeschi — 2023-10-30

The Possible Significance of the Student Revolt (1968)

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

Back on Sorgane. An Open Neighborhood Adhering to Existence

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

An Architect Facing the Problems of a City (1952)

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

Exploratory Research in Urban Form and the Future of Florence

Leonardo Ricci — 2023-10-30

“Architecture is a Problem of Freedom”

Giovanni Michelucci — 2023-10-30