Thursday 18 February 2010

Antonio Sant'Elia

I saw Antonio Sant'Elia's amazing line drawings from La Citta Nuova for the first time yesterday, and was compelled to find out a little more about him—his story is an interesting one. Sant'Elia studied public works construction, graduating as a Master Builder before opening a design office in Milan in 1912 and focusing on architecture.

Sant'Elia's initial influences were probably those of Art Nouveau, but it was his industrialised vision for the cities of the future that led to his introduction to Futurism. With La Citta Nuova, he was certainly one of the first of the European architects (if not the first) to envision skyscraper-style living, coupled with an interconnection and integration of multiple buildings into one cohesive whole.

Considering the hugely influential nature of his drawings and ideas, Sant'Elia's architectural career was very brief. His famous Citta Nuova drawings were all produced in the space of a few years (1912-14), before he was killed serving with the Italian military in 1916.

There's an interesting short essay here comparing some of Sant'Elia's ideas with those of modern architects, by examining the MIT campus. For further information and works, please take a look at the sources below.