Pier Luigi Nervi in Africa. Evoluzione e dissoluzione dello Studio Nervi 1964-1980
by Micaela Antonucci and Gabriele Neri, and preface by Ana Tostões (Macerata, Quodlibet, 2021)

Docomomo International is trilled to announce that next Friday, 19th November 2021, between 17H00 and 19H00 (CET) will take place online via Zoom the event “Liberi Libri” – Libri e autori@PoliTo, to celebrate the launching of the book Pier Luigi Nervi in Africa.
Evoluzione e dissoluzione dello Studio Nervi 1964-1980.

Organized by Politecnico di Torino, the event will be moderated by the authors Micaela Antonucci and Gabriele Neri, and invited guests Sergio Pace (Referente del Rettore per i Servizi Bibliotecari, Bibliografici e Museali, Politecnico di Torino), Tomà Berlanda (University of Cape Town, School of Architecture, Planning & Geomatics) and Ana Tostões (Universidade de Lisboa – Instituto Superior Técnico, Chair of Docomomo International).

“In the many stories so far written about Pier Luigi Nervi, one of the most celebrated engineers and architects of the 20th century, Africa has remained a totally unexplored field. Yet, between 1964 and 1980 Studio Nervi – directed by Nervi together with his sons Antonio, Mario and Vittorio – developed a solid network of contacts at this continent, which led to the involvement of the studio in almost 40 projects. There are buildings built (among the most significant, the Good Hope Center in Cape Town, the headquarters of the Banque Africaine de Développement in Abidjan and the presidential chapel of Yamoussoukro), but also many ideas which, although remaining on paper, reveal a surprising mosaic of relations with the most diverse clients, in South Africa, Ivory Coast, Libya, Congo, Nigeria, Central African Republic, Tanzania and Algeria.

Thus the intertwining of professional, political, economic and cultural relationships between Italy and Africa emerges against the light, in the moment in which the postcolonial identity of the great continent is redefined.

The events of African works are also central in the painful transition from the “epic” phase of Studio Nervi, linked to the name and fame of its founder, to that marked by the managerial and expressive autonomy of the children, against the background of a profound transformation of the practice professional. A passage that could perhaps have led the firm towards new horizons, but which remained an interrupted path, due to the untimely death of the firstborn Antonio in 1979, six months after his father.

For more information, please visit the announcement at Politecnico di Torino’s website

ZOOM link: click here