Session M45 - Reinventing the old. The historicist Revival Between XIXth and XXth Centuries and the Image of Cities: Reconstructions, Renovations, Reinventions.
Coordinators: Paola Lanaro (isabella.cecchini@gmail.com)
Read Session abstractIn the course of the urban renovation crossing – with different outcomes – the European territory from the second half of the eighteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth, the issue of reconstructing and rebuilding in historicist style becomes more and more evident. Famous example include the restoring works theorized and put into practice by Viollet Le Duc in France or Camillo Boito in Italy, but also the restoration of interiors of late antique and medieval churches that wipes away any subsequent decorations and altars (usually pertaining to the Baroque period), or the spreading of the eclectic style. Renovations, and in many instances reconstructions, of buildings with the employ of a previous architectural style follow different paths in different contexts, and their outcomes greatly differ. Verona offers an emblematic case study: the so-called House of Juliet Capuleti, which renders its host city one of the most visited in Italy, is actually a pastiche owed to the Director of the Public Museums in Verona from 1915 to 1955, Antonio Avena, who tried to re-create the material city Shakespeare invented; Avena took also the initiative to piece together the Museo di Castelvecchio using medieval architectural elements from destroyed palaces.
This session aims to analyse and compare case studies of buildings which went into reconstruction, rebuilding or reinvention according to an architectural style that drew on the past, and to assess their impact on the image of the city or of the part of the town where they were located. One of the issue of concern is the perception of urban spaces affected by the historicist revival, and its connection with the rising concern about tourism. Another issue is cost: is it possible to assemble the costs of reconstructions? If revivals could tend – as it seems – towards more expensive buildings, for which reason were they preferred? Which was their added value, apart from aesthetics? This conference session intends to compare case studies from Italy and Europe, and possibly to stretch over non-European cases too, trying to connect the use of architectural past to the perception (be it turistic or generally cultural) of the cities that rebuilded this same past.Keywords: historicist revival; perception of the city; tourism and travel; restoration
Saturday 1st September 2018
Room 10 09.30-11.00, 11.30-13.00
PAPERS
The reconstruction of the Minoan heritage, the tourism industry and the modernization of the island of Crete in the beginnings of the 20th century.
Maria Nodaraki
Bringing the architectural past of Moscow into the realm of today: new gains and new losses.
Olga Zinovieva
GOTHIC REVIVAL IN EDINBURGH: “A PATHWAY TO ROMANCE, THROUGH THE POINTED ARCH OF MEDIEVAL MYSTICISM”
Giovanni Spizuoco
Reconstructing, Renovating and Reinventing the House of Savoy: Charles Felix and the Abbey of Hautecombe
Tommaso Zerbi
Restoring the Tombs of Glossatori, reinventing Medieval Bologna
Thomas Renard
