Armando Brasini (Rome, 21 September 1879 - Rome, 18 February 1965) was a prominent Italian architect and urban designer of the early twentieth century and exemplar ofFascist architecture. His work is notable for its eclectic and visionary style inspired byAncient Roman architecture,Italian Baroque architecture andGiovanni Battista Piranesi.[1]
Armando Stefano Ludovico Brasini was born in the Roman district ofTor di Nona from a family of modest background, the son of Augusto Brasini and Rosa Piersigilli.[2]: 19 After having successfully attended theInstitute of Fine Arts, he started specializing in renovation of old buildings and interior decoration. In 1897-1898 he worked withRaffaello Ojetti [it] on the renovation of theCastello Orsini-Odescalchi inBracciano for its owner, PrinceBaldassarre Odescalchi [it].[2]: 19 In the early 1900s he worked on the decoration of the Roman churches ofSanta Teresa andSan Camillo de Lellis, both withTullio Passarelli [it], and on stucco work inSanta Maria dei Miracoli [it].[2]: 21-22 In 1912, he teamed withMarcello Piacentini for the winning entry in a competition for the remodeling ofPiazza Navona, which was, however, not implemented. In those years he operated from a spacious office inPalazzo dei Piceni [pt] in the center of Rome.[2]: 22 In 1917 he created stucco decoration in thePalazzo Chigi following its purchase by the Italian state.[2]: 38 Immediately afterWorld War I he proposed a colossal memorial to theBattle of Vittorio Veneto, featured a cascade flanked by giant statues, that would have been carved on the nearbyPizzocco mountain.[2]: 23&25 In the early 1920s he worked withGiuseppe Volpi, then Governor ofTripolitania, on the remodeling ofTripoli. There he designed the Savings Bank Building (Palazzo della Cassa di Risparmio, now the country's central bank), the waterfront boulevard (Lungomare Conte Volpi, nowAd-dahra Al-kebira), the renovation of theRed Castle, and the memorial to the Italian conquest (Monumento ai Caduti e alla Vittoria).[3] In 1925-1926, he also produced the first master plan for the expansion ofTirana, where Italian influence was significant at the time. That plan was partly implemented, and elements of Brasini's design still exist in the layout ofSkanderbeg Square and in the city's major north–south axis, nowDëshmorët e Kombit Boulevard.[4] In 1929 he was appointed a member of the newly createdRoyal Academy of Italy.
Brasini also designed sets and costumes for silent movies, includingTheodora (1921) andQuo Vadis (1924).[5]: 122
Brasini had a lifelong interest inurban design. In 1925–27, he conceived a project for a remodeling of Rome's center dubbed the "Mussolini Forum" (Italian:Foro Mussolini) which would have entailed the demolition of much of theCampo Marzio, leaving the ancient monuments (Pantheon,Column of Marcus Aurelius,Obelisk of Montecitorio) standing alone in large urban spaces.[6]: 276-278 Brasini's emphasis on facilitating car traffic at the cost of the old city fabric has elicited comparisons withLe Corbusier's 1925Plan Voisin for Paris, despite the obvious stylistic difference.[6]: 100 In 1927, he was commissioned by theMinistry of Public Education to design a master plan for theFlaminio neighborhood, on which he had already worked in 1915.[2]: 22, 26 In 1931, he participated in the committee for a new city plan of Rome (Commissione del Piano Regolatore di Roma),[2]: 26 and in 1934 he was a member of the jury for thePalazzo Littorio project that would have faced theBasilica of Maxentius across theVia dell'Impero (nowVia dei Fori Imperiali).[6]
His prestige projects in Rome included, in the 1920s, thechurch of the Sacred Heart of Mary inParioli and the sprawlingComplesso del Buon Pastore on Via di Bravetta, and in the 1930s, the seat ofIstituto nazionale per l'assicurazione contro gli infortuni sul lavoro buttressingQuirinal Hill, as well as thePonte Flaminio. He also designed major public buildings in Southern Italy: thePalazzo del Podestà inFoggia (built between 1928 and 1932), and the massivePalazzo della Prefettura inTaranto (built from 1930 to 1934).
Brasini produced designs for a number of major projects that were never built. In 1931 he participated in the competition for thePalace of the Soviets inMoscow. In the 1930s he produced various designs for a colossalMole Littoria in Rome, intended to celebrate Mussolini's imperial achievements and matchAlbert Speer's plans for Nazi Berlin. Mussolini did not approve the project, however, due to its high costs and competing projects ofEUR. In 1939 he designed a new cathedral forAddis Ababa, and in 1956 a colossal lighthouse intended as a monument to Christianity in theSaxa Rubra neighborhood of Rome.[5]: 123
For the EUR, Brasini in 1938 designed a monumental Forestry Institute named afterAlessandro Mussolini, Benito's father, whose construction started in 1940 but was suspended in 1942 for war reasons. The partly built structure was demolished in 1957 and replaced by the General House of theMarist Brothers, in spite of Brasini's attempts to promote alternative design options to save the construction.
FollowingWorld War II, Brasini no longer received major commissions in Italy, but he remained involved in the completion of some of his projects, such as the Ponte Flaminio and the Parioli basilica. He produced plans for the city ofRiyadh and a royal palace there, at the invitation of the government ofSaudi Arabia (1954), and for abridge over theStrait of Messina (1956-1963).[2]: 26 [5]: 123 He died in 1965 in the house he had designed for himself on Via Flaminia.
Paolo Portoghesi, while acknowledging the "undoubted architectural merits" of Brasini's designs, defines him as "one of the great misfits of twentieth-century architecture" for generally not being "in tune with the spirit of the times," but rather representing "a case of estrangement from that spirit."[7]
