Jean-Lucien Bonillo

 

 

During the inter-war period Italy was marked by a policy of strong state control of architecture and urban planning, as were other totalitarian regimes such as Germany and the Soviet Union. Influenced by the Futurist movement – one of the first radical avant-garde movements of the early 20th century – Benito Mussolini handed out building projects both to architects of the Modern Rationalist Movement and to those preferring the more academic and traditional movement typified by the National Union of Architects. Active in the latter, Marcello Piacentini, creator of the stile littorio (a style inspired by the architecture of Ancient Rome), nevertheless seems to have been singled out by the regime and given many prestigious projects to work on.

 

As well as ideological, Mussolini's aims were economic and social, and his policy of major works was split on two levels, parts of which are in the film:

·      on the one hand territorial, with the reclamation of the Pontine Marshes  in Latium, some 60 kilometres south of Rome (an urban planning project for five small new towns, including the famous Sabaudia); the plan to improve the Val d’Aosta, conceived under the auspices of Olivetti (but never carried out); and EUR 42 (Esposizione Universale Roma), a new town south of Rome meant to celebrate the twentieth anniversary the Fascist Party in 1942.

·      On the other hand urban, with the renovation of the historic centres of Italy's major towns: Rome, Turin, Genoa, Naples, Florence, Brescia. The transformations within Rome, shown here, of course have a particular significance, the capital city symbolising not only a united Italy but also the Roman Empire, on which the Fascist vision of grandeur and conquest was based. A vision which served the pan-Mediterranean ambitions of the Duce.

 

In 1925 Mussolini, identifying with the Emperor Augustus, began a new plan to modernize the city, vowing to make “the third Rome a city of marble.” The film shows the major works in detail. They were planned in five stages and began symbolically with a huge sports complex, the “Foro Mussolini” (renamed Foro Italico after the war).

 

The idea was to programme many contractors to build new central units (demolishing part of the old city centres was taken for granted), these new centres being connected with the existing ones in the same way that St. Peter's and the Vatican are linked to Rome's historic centre. Everything obeyed the Baroque and Haussmann-style principles of urban planning.

 

From the architectural point of view, one should note the strong influence of the “stile littorio”, a monumental but simplified neo-classicism playing on tectonic elements and classical decoration: walls, columns, pillars, arches. The paintings and sculptures in and around the buildings are reminiscent of Roman traditions: peasant virtues and military victories. This style of architecture was designed to go hand in hand with state propaganda, to illustrate its values ​​and ideology. However, formal architecture was not an absolute rule. The film shows how the new university, despite being commissioned by the State, expresses a considerable variety of architectural trends.

 

 

-    Cesare de Seta, La cultura architettonica in Italia tra le due guerre, Bari, ed. Laterza, 1972.

-    Spiro Kostof, The third Rome 1870 – 1950: traffic and glory, Berkeley University Art museum, 1973.

-    Silvia Danesi et Luciano Patetta (dir), 1914 – 1943 Rationalisme et architecture en Italie, CERA/Electa France/Mardaga, 1977 (La biennale de Venise, 1976 pour la 1ère édition).

-    Manfredo Tafuri et Francesco dal Co, Architecture contemporaine, Paris, éd. Berger – Levrault, 1982 (1ère édition, Electa, 1976).

-     Giorgio Ciucci, Italian architecture during the fascist period: classicism between neoclassicism and rationalism, the many souls of the classical, in The Harvard architectural review, 6, 1988.