The infinite of the non-finito • Marco Frascari

• Carleton University

• DIRECTOR’S LECTURE 2011

Typical after the war inconplete constructions in Northern Italy slowly erected and mostly never finished by emigrants during their vacation time spent in their place

of origin

Years went by, but the Italians did not lost the vice of

leaving unfinish building around

A twenty years old unfinished building in Ragusa (contrada Treppiedi, Modica) demolished on Sept 4th 2011

•  ‘Non-finito’ is an art history expression mainly used to refer to Michelangelo’s uncompleted sculptures: a celebrated art technique pioneered by in sculpture by Donatello before him.

•  My proposal, following the convention set by Zevi, is to use the same locution in architecture to indicate those buildings that have been left, for a number of possible reasons, in an elegant but incomplete state by architects or builders.

•  I propose to show that unfinished edifices, through their being suspended in time, the non-finito state, affects in a positive way the brain-body activity of people that partake of their architecture and make a beneficial use of them even in their incompleteness. On the other hand, deficient architecture, even if completed and whole, always affects our brains in a negative way.

This essay on the architectural non-finito is intended as a contribution, however small, towards an understanding of the role of neuroscience in understanding the facture of architecture. It is commonly thought that the physical sciences have, to the present day, governed the stages of human factures while increasingly future factures will be controlled by physiological sciences and especially by neurobiology. Physics  and  chemistry  have  ruled  the  making  of  building  and  by  now  their  contributions  are  considered  mature  branches  of  learning  contributing  to  architecture.    With  the  aim  always  to  increase  comfort  and  wellbeing,  using  a  proper  understanding  of  the  physical  environment  architects  have  been  able  to  subjugate  positively  building  tectonics.    

Inconpiuto Siciliano An Internet site dealing with unfinished

contemporary Italian buildings

•  Incompiuto Siciliano is a project in progress that aims to identify and classify the aesthetic and formaI characteristics of unfinished public architecture in ltaly. The survey, carried out by Alterazloni Video together with Enrico Sgarbi and Claudia D'Aita, has so far resulted in tne classification of around 500 unfinished architectural projects.

•  The Italian region with the highest number of unfinished public works is Sicily and for this reason the style identified by the researchers, widespread in Italy during the 1960s and 1970s, was dubbed "Unfinished Sicilian". The intention of the project was not merely to expose the phenomenon, but also to promote dynamic acceptance of it in order to trigger virtuous response mechanisms.

Playground within the Archeological Park of Giarre (CT), Italy. ���One of building listed in the Incompiuto Siciliano and used to demonstrate how to transform uncompleted and abandoned building. ������Proposal for transforming the existing built structure in an acceptable presence in the Park

San Petronio (Bologna)

During many earlier historical periods a quite large number of buildings had been left unfinished and for many diverse reasons.

Cathedral of Siena

Many of those buildings are perfect cases of elegantly non-finito work, and if people walking by the them are questioned about the building they acknowledge that it is incomplete, that perhaps the top part of façade marble works are missing, almost as they have never noticed it

“… yeah … you are right ... it is unfinished!”

SANT ANDREA MANTOVA

Giulio Romano, Transept San Andrea (Mantova)

L.B.Alberti, Tempio Malatestiano, (Rimini)

Leon Battista Alberti Palazzo Rucellai

Palladio, Palazzo Porto in Piazza Castello (VICENZA)

Palladio, Loggia del Capitanio (Vicenza)

The most Incomplete Palladio’s Villa Porto (Molina di Malo)

Casa Cogollo Vicenza

Know as Palladio’s House

Michelangelo Non-Finito Prigioni & Pieta Rondanini

The intentional non-finito

CASA Palladio Or

Casa Cogollo

Casa Cogollo

Immorsature (stone-teething or stone tenons)

for the continuation of the facade

Palladio’s House or Casa Cogollo •  Bertotti Scamozzi’s drawing showing the facade as finished architecture

Possible extensions of the Cogollo’s House Facade

L.Battista Alberti Palazzo Rucellai

completed

So nothing new under the sun

San Salvatore Spoleto Italy

•  T h e b a s i l i c a o f S a n Salvatore (4th-5th century) incorporates the cella of a Roman temple and is one of the most important examples of Early Christian architecture. It was rebuilt p r o b a b l y a f t e r a n earthquake and fire by the Lombards during the 8th century using also many f r a gm e n t s o f r om a n temples in the valley

Mater Misericordiae Angelo Mangiarotti

Baranzate milano 1957

The Ningbo Historic Museum was designed by Wang Shu

of  Amateur Architecture Studio

41 �

Public library in Villanueva, Colombia

53�

Mortensrud church Norway JSA

Jensen & Skodvin Arkitektkontor Design Period: 1998 – 1999 Construction period: 2000-200

The church is situated on the top of a small crest with large pine

trees and some exposed rock. Geometrically

speaking the church is an addition to the

existing ground, no blasting and

excavation was necessary except

carefully removing the thin layer of soil.

57�

Igualada Cemetery (also known as Cemetery Nou) was built by Carme Pinòs and Enric Miralles after an architectural

competition held in 1984.

Peter Zumthor

Brother Klaus Chapel

Model Brother Klaus Chapel

Kolumba Museum Peter Zumthor

Cognition & Duration

•  In pre-modern Europe, architects built not just using imagination, drawings, brick and mortar.

•  Architects built with time, using vast quantities of duration as a primary means to erect buildings that otherwise would have been impossible. Not mere medieval muddling-through, this entailed a highly developed set of norms and efficient practices.

•  A powerful temporal program, involving an uncodified set of building principles, guided the long-term planning and making great architecture for a vita beata.

Non Finito is Time in the mind: Using architecture to think about time and

using time to think about architecture. "   (a) They moved the wall forward two meters.

(b) They moved the meeting forward two hours.

"   People talk about time in terms of space more often than they talk about space in terms of time

"   This pattern in language suggests that our conceptions of space and time might be asymmetrically dependent: we construct representations of time by co-opting mental representations of space, but not necessarily the converse.

"   People often talk about time using spatial language (e.g., a long vacation, a short concert).

"   Do people also think about time using spatial representations, even when they are not using language?

"   (a) They moved the wall forward two meters. (b) They moved the meeting forward two hours