Lightness and depth. The case of Renzo Piano’s itinerant architectures

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.26754/ojs_zarch/zarch.20242210342

Keywords:

Itinerant architecture, mobile structures, community engagement, traveling pavilion, sustainability

Abstract

This essay examines the legacy of itinerant architecture through Renzo Piano's early architectural endeavors, notably the Laboratorio di Quartiere in Otranto (1979) and the IBM Traveling Pavilion (1982-86), focusing on their strategies for spatial occupation. Piano’s projects are situated within a historical and cultural narrative that spans from post-war Italy's architectural challenges to global corporate strategies in the late 20th century. The text navigates the complexities of conceiving structures that are both rooted and rootless, local and global, permanent and ephemeral. It highlights the tension between the democratizing aspirations of mobile architecture and its appropriation by corporate and market forces. This analysis instigates a reconsideration of the relationship between architecture and land by unveiling how the apparent lightness of temporary architecture is nevertheless dependent on the extractive practices fueling global economies.

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Author Biography

Marina Otero Verzier, Columbia University GSAPP

Marina Otero Verzier is an architect and researcher. She studied at TU Delft, ETSA Madrid, and Columbia GSAPP. In 2016, she received her doctorate from ETSA Madrid. Her doctoral thesis, "Evanescent Institutions" (2016), examines the emergence of new paradigms for institutions and, in particular, the political implications inherent in mobile and transient structures. She has curated exhibitions such as 'Compulsive Desires: On Lithium Extraction and Rebellious Mountains' at the Galería Municipal do Porto in 2023, 'Work, Body, Leisure' at the Dutch Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2018, and 'After Belonging' at the Oslo Architecture Triennale in 2016. She has co-edited publications including Automated Landscapes (2023), Lithium: States of Exhaustion (2021), A Matter of Data (2021), More-than-Human (2020), Architecture of Appropriation (2019), Work, Body, Leisure (2018), and After Belonging (2016), among others. Since 2020, Otero has been the Director of the Master in Social Design at the Design Academy Eindhoven. The program focuses on design practices oriented towards ecological and social challenges. From 2015 to 2022, she was the Director of Research at Het Nieuwe Instituut, where she led initiatives focused on labor, extraction, and mental health from an architectural and post-anthropocentric perspective, including "Automated Landscapes," "BURN-OUT," and "Lithium: States of Exhaustion." Previously, she was the Director of Global Network Programming at Studio-X, Columbia GSAPP. In 2022, she received Harvard's Wheelwright Prize for a project on the future of data storage. Her winning proposal, Future Storage: Architectures to Host the Metaverse, examines new architectural paradigms for storing data and how the reimagining of digital infrastructures could meet the unprecedented demands facing the world today.

References

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Published

2024-06-27

How to Cite

Otero Verzier, M. (2024). Lightness and depth. The case of Renzo Piano’s itinerant architectures. ZARCH. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies in Architecture and Urbanism, (22), 12–23. https://doi.org/10.26754/ojs_zarch/zarch.20242210342

Issue

No. 22 (2024): In between permanence and temporariness. On camps, urbanity and time

Section

Featured texts