Italy | 14th Architecture Biennale

“Archimbuto”, entrance of the Italian Pavilion | Innesti Grafting. Photo by Marina Caneve

Innesti-Grafting | Italian Pavilion

The title of the Italian pavilion exhibition at the 14th Venice Biennale, Innesti-Grafting, refers to the insertion of modern architecture into the composite and patchy Italian territory that occurred during the last century. For the curator Cino Zucchi that was an “anomalous modernity”, since it must incorporate the given historical background through an incessant metamorphosis.
Thus the exhibition is focused on the process of “grafting” modernity into pre-existing urban conditions, by presenting four major themes.

Left to right: Barozzi/Veiga, School of music, Brunico (BZ) 2012 © Barozzi/Veiga
Onsitestudio, ASL building, Milan 2010 © Onsitestudio
Raimondo Guidacci, Two houses, Orsara Di Puglia (FG) 2006, © Alberto Muciaccia

 Axonometric view of the Italian pavilion © CZA

The pavilion features four main sections

Expo 2015 – a Laboratory for the Environment
This section presents the work-in-progress of the 2015 Expo in Milan.
In “2030 EXPOst”, some young architects envisage possible future metamorphoses of the area of the Expo after the conclusion of the world’s fair.

Milan – Laboratory of Modernity
The exhibition depicts the architectural history of Milan by analyzing some cases which are emblematic of the city’s modernization process.

“It is not true that the higher the building the greater its beauty” from Domenica del Corriere 2 October 1955. © CZA

A Contemporary Landscape
Several boxes, supporting back-lit images of various architectural projects, are disseminated in a darkened space. The exhibition does not have a precise order, but the exposed projects, placed side by side in an apparently random disposition, all share a common aspect: a careful approach to the economic, environmental, programmatic, and social contexts.

Inhabited landscape life adapts to the spaces which adapt to life
This section features a film, that the visitors can watch by sitting on several yellow deckchairs, which collects many videos, realized by non-professionals, depicting everyday life in small historical towns, malls, and public squares; thus presenting a mosaic of the various aspects of Italian life.

The strip at the Maidens’  Italian Pavilion |Innesti Grafting. Photo by Marina Caneve

See all Inexhibit magazine articles on the 14th Venice Biennale from the link below to the index page!