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"Luminous Art & Design :: Art & Artists"
Aldo Rossi :: Biography and Books"
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Aldo Rossi (1931-1997) was an Italian architect known for his timeless designs. Rossi wrote ‘The Architecture of the City’ (1966) and ‘A Scientific Autobiography’ (1981). Rossi best-known designs of the cemetery of San Cataldo and Teatro del Mondo.
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Aldo Rossi (1931-1997) was an Italian architect known for his timeless designs. He was one of the most influential architects since the 1960s and the protagonist of Rational architecture (Tendenza). He achieved international recognition in theory, drawing and architecture. The late Aldo Rossi was described as ‘a poet who happens to be an architect’.
Aldo Rossi was born on 3 May 1931, in Milan, Italy. His father ran the Rossi bicycle factory that was founded by his grandfather. In 1949, Rossi entered the Polytechnic of Milan, where he graduated from the Faculty of Architecture ten years later. At the same time, he began working for the design magazine Casabella-Continuità, becoming its editor in 1961.
Rossi published a very influential book in 1966; ‘The Architecture of the City’. In this book he proposed continuity between architecture and urban design. He argued that a city must be studied and valued as something constructed over time. Out of this theoretical base came timeless designs that seem always to be a part of the city, rather than an intrusion.
One of his best-known projects is the cemetery of San Cataldo, Modena. While recuperating in a hospital after a car accident, he started to think of cemeteries as cities of the dead and was inspired to design the cemetery that won first prize in 1971.
Teatro del Mondo is another well-known design of Aldo Rossi. This floating theatre was designed for the 1980 Venice Biennale. It seated 250 and was towed out to Punta della Dogana in the sea.
In 1981 Rossi published his second book; ‘A Scientific Autobiography’, in which the private and poetic aspects of architecture were stressed. The book is a memoir of architectural projects and Rossi’s personal history, and discusses the major literary and artistic influences on his work.
In the 1980s, projects of increasing scale were built in Italy and Rossi received many commissions outside his native country. Some of his works from this period are; the Rauchstrasse apartment building (1983-1985) and the Sudliche Friedrichstadt housing complex (1981-1988) in Germany. The Carlo Felice Theater in Genoa (1983-1990), the Casa Aurora in Turin (1984-1987), and the Centro Torri in Parma (1985-1988), all in Italy. And Hotel Il Palazzo at Fukuoka in Japan (1987). These achievements were recognized in 1990 when Aldo Rossi won the prestigious Pritzker Prize for architecture.
In 1995, Aldo Rossi started on a design of a 76-acre timeshare resort for Walt Disney. The $250-million Italian-style Mediterranean village along the Newport Coast would offer gondola rides along quiet man-made canals, 650 condominiums, several tennis courts, a golf course and a fake Roman aqueduct that spills into swimming pools.
Aldo Rossi did not only work on architecture, but designed furniture and household items as well. Today one can wear a Rossi wristwatch, sit in a Rossi chair sipping espresso from a Rossi coffee pot and eat from Rossi porcelain dinnerware.
Aldo Rossi died in a car accident in 4 September 1997.
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