Il progetto come “modificazione dell'esistente”

Starting from a study elaborated within the Departments of Architecture of the University of Naples and Spatial Design of the University of Aachen, this essay proposes a reflection on one possible way of intervening in the historical city and on an artefact to which the historical documentary value of monumentum or primary element is recognised (Rossi, 1966).
Specifically, the historical city object of interest is the city of Venice, whose structure has been investigated using consolidated urban analysis tools – Straßenbau and Schwarzplan – and the most recent spatial analysis tool – Rotblauplan – in order to understand its urban form, and therefore its space, and then reflect on its possible transformation by virtue of design action (Arís, 2016).
The monumentum is the famous “unfinished palace” Venier dei Leoni, located in the Dorsoduro district, on the banks of the Grand Canal, whose incompleteness represents an interesting opportunity to investigate the theme of “building in the built” (De Fusco, 1988). A theme which, in this case, takes on complex connotations since it is not only a question of intervention concerning an artefact of great value, but also in a historical city as difficult to interpret as Venice.
The reading and the resulting design outcome (The spatiality of the Italian cities. The Peggy Guggenheim museum in Venice) represents an attempt to intervene in the existing heritage with the awareness of the need for a transformation made possible by an analytical reading of both the historical fabric and the artefact aimed at protecting their formal and figural identity. Construction and fabric are taken as the very material of action, giving them new perspectives in line with contemporary needs but, at the same time, critically reconsidering the lesson of history and the syntactical orders that the typological legacy contains.

Keywords: architecture, city, modification, Venice.