Franco Albini
Franco Albini ( born October 17, 1905 in Robbiate, Lecco Province; † 1 November 1977, in Milan ) was an Italian architect and designer.
Life
Albini studied architecture at the Milan Polytechnic, where he graduated in 1929. After working briefly in the office of Gio Ponti in 1930, he opened his own architectural office in Milan. In 1952, he began a partnership with Franca Helg Office 1962 with Antonio Piva and 1965 finally with his son Marco Albini.
Albini's first professional years have been characterized by its proximity to the young architects of the Italian rationalist architecture and the predominantly theoretical working Edoardo Persico, of the magazine " Casabella " ran from 1933 to 1936. Already with Albini's first project, the pavilion for the Istituto Nazionale delle Assicurazioni ( INA) at the Milan Fair ( 1935), the influence of rationalist architecture through the clear geometries and reduced language is clear. In this consistent attitude Albini designs many projects in the following years - from urban planning, to architecture to design.
1945-1946 Albini directs the magazine " Casabella " (then under the name of " Casabella Costruzioni ").
In the immediate postwar period, Albini uses contrast to the architecture of Neorealism. Its built 1949-1951 Youth " Pirovano " in Cervinia is one of the first small solitary buildings of Neorealism. The clear commitment to a traditional shaped by rural context architecture is obvious. The characteristic wooden and stone architecture of the Alps serves Albini as direct model.
A key project for Albini's oeuvre is the design of the museum in the Palazzo Bianco in Genoa ( 1950-1951 ). The Albini while practicing significant settling of the new from the old, the visualization of contrasts is leading the way for many other museum projects - such as also the Museo di Castelvecchio in Verona by Carlo Scarpa - and building in the historic inventory. Both the museum in the Palazzo Bianco and Albini's overall design for the Museo del Tesoro di San Lorenzo, realized in 1952-1956 Genoa, represent a new way of addressing a historic shell. Albini understands the rooms of the museum as a container in which it presents the exhibits in stresses at the same time noble and restrained way. With steel steles, illuminated by neon lights with cabinets, with far guyed from the ceiling steel cables and mobile hydraulic metal studs Albini demonstrates a completely new museum architecture.
With the construction of the department store " La Rinascente " in Rome (1959-1961) Albini demonstrates the subtle integration of a modern building in a historical context. The matt black steel structure used in this case, which divides the structure in the horizontal plane, is a decidedly modern interpretation of the cornices of the Roman Renaissancepalazzi. The infill with the reddish stone slabs corresponds to the existing material language of the city.
Albini is one of the most important representatives of Italian rationalism, which he - like BBPR - applies in the postwar period in moderate shape.
Teaching
From 1949 to 1954 Albini worked as a lecturer at the Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia ( IUAV ), from 1952 he taught there, the subject " Design and interior design ." 1954-1955 he took a visiting professorship at the Faculty of Architecture of the Politecnico di Torino, shortly after he returns as a visiting professor at the IUAV back to Venice. From 1964 to 1977 Albini teaches as a full professor, the subject " Architectural Design " at the Milan Polytechnic.