Architecture travels to Rome

To be published in: S. Zapke/E. Gruber, Medieval Vienna in Context (A Companion to medieval Europe) Brill 2020., 2020

Pictorial traditions, to which we may reckon the products of early cartography as well as cityscapes, are among the witnesses to a distant past that probably most fascinate modern people. First, they allow a more detailed picture of the physical setting, a deeper understanding of the living environment and living conditions in former times. Interest in visual sources has significantly increased with the development of new approaches from cultural studies perspectives. In these, the "iconic" or "pictorial turn" plays a special role, with emphasis on the increased attention given in research to visual sources and to the development of a truly scholarly science of the image. 1 New and deeper insights have provided by efforts to see early pictorial evidence in every case as part of the circumstances of its specific genesis and impact. In so doing, research studies are brought together under the theoretical concept of "mediality", in which the importance of the medial form is considered within the interdisciplinary framework of studies of culture, literature, art, cartography and media. 2 The outer framework, within which the pictorial evidence for cities and landscapes formed and merged, is marked by a series of external as well as technical and intellectual developments. The great breakthrough was undoubtedly the advent of technologies of reproduction in the wake of the invention of printing in the late Middle Ages. Before then, depictions of town and country were limited by the possibilities offered by the graphic and 1 In relation to Vienna see Opll, Bild und Wahrnehmung der Stadt. -This article was completed in spring 2017. 2 See the survey of research in Stercken, "Medien und Vermittlung gesellschaftlicher Ordnung", pp. 212-25.

2011

Considering the physical elements of the city system as the material expression of all the evolutionary phenomena of sites, its representation can be considered as a system of general knowledge capable of coalescing heterogeneous information. The enormous changes that take place in cities over the years have determined an evolution of the morphological variations in the territorial setup, in the architectural stratification of the urban structure and in the perception and use of urban space. If urban space is considered as a place where people interact, then bibliographical, iconographic and cartographic sources contribute to providing a diachronic reconstruction of the urban fabric, which is possible thanks to the historical representations produced over the years, which are sometimes symbolic if not metaphorical: these representations make it possible to understand the sites even if their accuracy is debatable. The use of computer science in survey and cartographic representation and the creation of regional IT systems has made it possible not only to establish interlinked georeferential databases, but above all facilitate multiple consultation and later elaboration. Digital cartography used to create three-dimensional models is therefore a way to review space - not on the basis of planimetric explorations but by creating virtual models more or less automatically generated based on the cartography itself. Three-dimensional cartography should be studied to identify specificities and details present in the restitution of the urban space; these characteristics immediately prompt one to try and use the same representative exuberance to reconstruct the historical past of the city or at least of some of its more important periods, especially the changes in its orography and constructions. The city of Rome is a paradigmatic example of a historical stratification that has constantly reused the same sites and physical structures and is unique insofar as its destiny as a modern capital dates back to the eighth century B.C. But real continuity belongs to the present because the kinetic and three-dimensional image seen by anyone walking the streets of Rome projects a range of different portraits of its historical past. The centre of Rome is an excellent study area also because it has a technically good selection of sufficiently continuous cartographic records to allow comparison between the different iconographic sources, on the one hand starting from the classical period with the Forma Urbis and the maquette by Gismondi which represent – albeit with their undeniable approximations - a good starting point, and, on the other, the 3D digital cartography made in 2000. KEY WORDS: Georeferential databases, urban tranformations, digital model, urban stratification, Rome, urban “caposaldi”.

2014

In the eighteenth century the evolution of measurement techniques based on trigonometric calculations and the codification of topography as an applied science in different European States resulted in the progressive substitution of traditional bird’s eye views with geometrically correct ichnographic representations of cities. The existence of precise and reliable cartographic information represents an analytical benchmark for the discipline of urban history. It makes possible to use modern information techniques for analysing the urban structure and its formal and functional contents from a ‘geographical-thematic’ perspective. This paper discusses the use of eighteenth-century cartographic and documentary sources for the purpose of analysing the characteristics and the transformation of the urban fabric of Rome within the Aurelian walls. The methodological aspects and the analytical results are taken from the project «Atlante di Roma moderna», promoted by the Centro di ateneo per lo...

2019

The evolution of cities can be interpreted through graphic elements, as recommended by Marco Pollio Vitruvius (1st century BC), whose forms of expression (plans, elevations and perspectives) are revealed as precious and reliable instruments to read the cities. Establishing mapping elements, they appear as representing cities and in various stages of construction of their urban networks. The iconography is an important element of analysis that allows a careful reading of the "reality" of cities at speci c times. In addition to understanding them as representative of static moments, they allow the current reinterpretation of the urban fabric. Adding new elements may be important in reading the cities, which are considered as dynamic tools for its understanding. Regarding cartography and iconography of various eras, we propose to make a comparative analysis of the historical urban fabric of two cities with deployment capabilities and differentiated urban development (Évora and Setúbal). To achieve our goals, we will read the morphological elements of the Medieval City (forti cation, street, square, medieval blocks; market; singular buildings) and its iconography in order to understand its diachronic evolution between their similarities and differences.

LEARNING FROM ROME: historical cities and contemporary design

The results of research in urban morphology describe historic cities as urban organisms whose survival, transformation and management needs design-based complex actions to be investigated by analytical tools integrating different knowledge. Architecture, History, Geography are speculative discipline and provide useful tools to properly direct architectural projects, whether they are conceived or not in continuity with the urban and architectural language of the traditional existing context. Preserve and renovate the historic cities and the historical urban tissues should be a new focus of urban policies and of those entrepreneurs and conservation professionals which have identied the abandonment of these urban realities as the emerging political and economic dynamics. The scope of the conference is to collect studies, research, design and methodological reections on contemporary architecture, urban contexts and historical building, directing the outcome to the denition of operational tools useful for a aware and contemporary design. In recent years the reuse, the recovery, the architectural transformation of urban fabric are among the most practiced topic of the international architectural culture based both on open interpretations or limited to the aspect of conservation. The conference will be an opportunity to discuss on contemporary design in the historic city, on tools and research methods to be applied to these architectural dynamic realities, and on operational tools used for designing such meaningful anthropological spaces. ________________________________________________________________________ Veja-se o resumo do artigo " Cartography and iconography as diachronic analysis tools of the urban fabric ─ Évora and Setúbal (ABSTRACT)" na secção "PUBLISHED PAPERS".

Periodica Polytechnica Architecture, 2018

Any analysis performed to gather data about architectural and urban heritage always begins with the observation of reality and the involvement established between the observer and the space around them. A spectator inevitably interprets what they see in a personal manner so as to give objects a specific meaning. The ability to understand the data and the relationship between the parts and then assign it a value varies from person to person. That the mind can mediate the mental processes of perception-action-thought means that any direct analysis to understand a cultural asset is scientifically extremely important. The critical process sparked by an on-site study exploits the concise graphic transcription of what is visible, including the graphics tool used to achieve that representation. This contribution will present a study performed by the author to gather data using the drawings of several domes in the historical centre of the city of Rome.

Renaissance Quarterly, 2006

Proceedings of the ICA, 2021

The representation of the areas in which some of the most significant events of the First World War took place has produced a wide range of materials, such as cartography, aerial and terrestrial photos, textual descriptions and field surveys. In addition, war events were also represented through three-dimensional models. Topographic maps and models constitute composite figurations, which are rich in informative data useful for the preservation of the memory of places and for increasing the knowledge of cultural heritage. Hence, these sources need to be studied, described, interpreted and used for future enhancement. The focus of this paper are archival materials from the collections kept at the Italian War History Museum of Rovereto (Museo Storico Italiano della Guerra), in the Trentino-Alto Adige region. Firstly, we will investigate the cartographic fond in order to assess the composition and origin of its materials. Secondly, we will present the Museum’s collection of Early-Twentieth Century models. Such precious heritage is not yet part of an exhibition, and is kept in the Museum’s warehouses. The paper constitutes the occasion to present the initial results of a still ongoing project by the Geo-Cartographic Centre for Study and Documentation (GeCo) of the University of Trento on the study and analysis of two archival complexes preserved in the abovementioned Museum. In particular, the paper focuses on the heuristic value of such representational devices, which enable an analysis of the different methods and languages through which space is planned and designed, emphasizing the complementarity between different types of visualization.