A week later, after a post about Patricia Urquiola, here we are at a new appointment with another voice of the feminine design: it is the turn of Gae Aulenti.

"Architecture is a job for men, but I always pretended nothing happened."

Do not call her starchitect: the lady of modern architecture, Gae Aulenti, was the antithesis. Visionary, intellectual, creative, brilliant, tireless: her work has gone through architectural design, restoration, industrial design, thus contributing to the success of Italian companies and design "made in Italy" design in the world.

Gae (diminutive of Gaetana) was born in Palazzolo della Stella (Udine), on 4 December 1927. Always active, even in politics, was part of the resistance, as she says in an interview on Corriere: Corriere:

"I served the Resistance, they trusted me and sometimes I carried out of the blocks the British missions pretending to have a roll in the hay. In Biella I was friends with two Jewish sisters that one day disappeared. My social consciousness was born there.". 

She graduated in Architecture at the Politecnico in Milan in 1953, and passionately followed the diatribe in the architecture of those years, divided between international rationalism and neo-Liberty, approaching the latter and carrying on the values of lightness and elegance.

Gae was also part of the editorial staff of the magazine Casabella and of the editorial board and executive council of Lotus International; she also worked as university assistant in the sixties.

Her restorative measures around the world were famous and challenging: the controversial Gare D'Orsay in Paris, now the Musee D'Orsay of Impressionist; the Palavela in Turin, the winter sports stadium; the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya; the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco; the Italian Cultural Institute in Tokyo; the former Scuderie of Quirinale in Rome, now an appreciated museum thanks to the quality of its exhibitions.

Even here in Sicily we have a token of the of Gae’s work in Palazzo Branciforte (Palermo), a multipurpose center that combines identity and innovation.

Gae firmly believed the importance of the context in which the architecture is going to integrate, carrying on the need of the architectural context in her works - a sort of constructive dialogue with the city:

"I think that the place is primarily a conceptual fact that a matter of culture: in fact, if you work in Paris, Barcelona, Milan or Rome, the cultural conditions are different. Understanding and knowing these differences becomes, for those who are about to plan, a necessity, since they have to work in continuity with the tradition of a place." - Gae Aulenti,  "Dentro l'architettura", 1996

In this way, the architecture becomes real, true, and indeed of those who use it: no more a stylistic exercise as an end in itself, but a shared work.

In the field of industrial design, it is impossible not to remember the Pipistrello lamp (1965), inspired by Art Nouveau, produced by Martinelli Luce and designed for Olivetti. Fifty years later, Pipistrello is still an iconic lamp, also exhibited at the MoMA in New York: its conical base and the diffusor that reminds the unfolding of the wings of a bat make it a "form harmoniously connceted with the context it was created for.".

Gae also curated Olivetti showroom in Paris (just with Pipistrello lamps, designed in 1967) and Buenos Aires.

During the time Gae has been the artistic director of Fontanarte, the historical company founded by Gio Ponti and Luigi Fontana, and has created two eclectic tables, an example of "design in motion": the Tavolo con Ruote and the Tavolo Tour, with a glass top and wheels to move easily in the house.

Gae has also worked for the theater, as set designer for numerous plays set on stage by Luca Ronconi, with whom she collaborated from 1976 to 1978 at the Design Laboratory theater of Prato.

Gae collected many awards during hes career; among them, the Legion d'Honneur by the French Republic, conferred by Francois Mitterand, the special prize for the Culture of the Italian Republic, the title of Commandeur dans l 'Ordre des Artes et des Lettre given to her by Jack Lang, the "Fashion Group Award" in New York and the "Premium Imperiale" of the Japan Art Association for architecture.

Gae died in 2012, a few days after receiving the Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement from the Milan Triennale.

We are not orphans at all of this great teacher of the last Italian avant-garde. Gae Aulenti has left an indelible signature in the architecture world: her works are her heritage. And the architecture, as it is art, is eternal and immortal.

"In her career there were many phases, many places, design, interiors, set design, where she was extraordinary, without ever giving up its dimension of woman." - Vittorio Gregotti, architect and urban planner 

 

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