by Stefano Poli<
Pier Luigi Nervi. Dai primi brevetti
al Palazzo delle Esposizioni di Torino 1917-1948
Claudio Greco,
Quart Edizioni, Lucerna 2008 (pp. 303, s.i.p.)
Immediately after World War II, the reinforced-concrete architecture
of Pier Luigi Nervi (1891-1980) seemed to have resolved the disunion
between casing and load-bearing structure that had been troubling
20th-century theorists and architects. Since then, the major and
controversial (Zevi, 1950) critical success of the Italian engineer’s most
seductive buildings has been partially obscured by his more far-reaching
professional career.
Claudio Greco’s book explores Nervi’s training and early career,
spanning from 1913, when he graduated in Bologna, to the inauguration
of Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Turin, in 1948.
With the aid of extensive archive investigation (Domus, December
1994), the author brings together the threads of the extraordinary and
determined experimental research that attained its most mature and balanced
results around 1950. Greco also redeems the most famous buildings
from the ambiguous interpretation – starting with the engineer’s own
writings – that had presented them mainly as the brilliant product of a
nebulous exchange between science and art.
Retracing the figure of Nervi to his university education and the
routine of his long professional career (commenced in the company of his
“master” Attilio Muggia and then pursued in two successful independent
engineering firms) meant stringing together an anthology of works
selected from thousands of projects distributed in several archives.
The selection, backed up by a rich and previously unpublished set of
illustrations, retraces a genetic line comprising the refined construction
solutions of the Berta Stadium (Florence 1930-32), the Italian Air
Force hangars (Orvieto, Orbetello and Torre del Lago, 1935-38) and, most
importantly, Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Turin (1948).
This approach shapes an account that penetrates the structural
logic behind Nervi’s buildings and uncovers how they function. With a
language that eschews needless technical jargon, the book shows readers
how Nervi accumulated productive intuitions and countless patents
in the search to perfect two main construction theories: the segmented
prefabrication of large support structures and the development of thin
concrete walls with evenly distributed reinforcement. Backed by extensive
knowledge of reinforced-concrete theories and applications, the
two inventions eventually came together in the innovative construction
system for Palazzo delle Esposizioni, which, paradoxically, frees the
forms and measurements from the limitations of the low-tech worksite
while actually originating from the backward and artisan nature of the
building sector.
The works presented in the book were therefore laborious and gradual
refinements of a personal design system that gained maturity from
on-site experience and tests on scale models rather than theoretical
calculations. This working method seems to combine a scientific method
and the artisan practice of experimentation,
in the sense of gamble,
attempt and intuition.
Favouring the period prior to
1950, considered his most innovative
and vibrant, the author focuses
mainly on the technical and constructional
aspects of Nervi’s professional
career. Nonetheless, the
more essentially cultural context
and the disciplinary debate of the
1930s are evoked in the engineer’s
relationships with architects and
leading architectural journals.
With a similar – but less justifiable
– time frame, the bibliography of
writings about him stops at 1951
and is only partly redeemed by the
lively accompanying notes on the
text. A precise list of works carried
out between 1917 and 1948, a
detailed list of the patents registered
and a prized transcription of
the most important ones complete
the presentation.
Science and art of engineering
Pier Luigi Nervi. Dai primi brevetti al Palazzo delle Esposizioni di Torino 1917-1948Claudio Greco, Quart Edizioni, Lucerna 2008 (pp. 303, s.i.p.) Claudio Greco’s book explores Nervi’s training and early career, spanning from 1913, when he graduated in Bologna, to the inauguration of Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Turin, in 1948.
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- 13 May 2009