Carlo Scarpa is an architect whose international notoriety is on the rise today, but who also has a strong connection to Venice and its territory. He was born in Venice and grew up in Vicenza. He graduated from the Regia Accademia delle Belle Arti in Venice. During the 1920s, while very young, he started a collaboration with the Murano glassworks and he started practicing as architect and teaching at Venice’s Regio Istituto Superiore di Architettura (later IUAV), activity which he will continue throughout all his career. His first completed project was the restoration of the Ca’ Foscari University seat (1937), where he demonstrated a great capability in redefining the inner spaces and a great sensitivity in the use of materials, a quality that will be present in all his future work. He was constantly involved in exhibition arrangement projects, especially for the Venice Biennale and the city’s permanent collections: although later modified by others, his work on the Gallerie dell’Accademia and the Museo Correr are still milestones in the history of museum outfitting on an international level, as are those in the Gipsoteca in Possagno and in Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo. Many of his choices in outfitting projects stem from his intense relationship with works of art, both antique and contemporary. He was always capable of highlighting the individuality of every piece, even when confronting different contexts, as he did with his Olivetti project in Piazza San Marco, in Venice. From the early 1970’s, Scarpa’s name imposed itself on the national scene, although his work was always marked by a deeply personal characterisation and a profound detachment from the themes that mark the work of many of his contemporaries. In the world of exhibition arrangements and museum outfitting, he cut out for himself an autonomous dimension directed towards remote contexts of time and space – as witnessed by his interest for Far Eastern civilisations. The greatest and most challenging project of his adult years was the renovation of the Museo di Castelvecchio in Verona. This project provided for a number of interventions on the different architectural bodies of the Scaliger castle; here Scarpa elaborated extraordinary solutions and designed an outfitting that marked the history of 20th century international museology. Over time, materials and construction processes became one of his richest research fields and steel and concrete allowed him to create some of his most originals interpretations of the building methods of the time. Carlo Scarpa is an architect whose international notoriety is on the rise today, but who also has a strong connection to Venice and its territory. He was born in Venice and grew up in Vicenza. He graduated from the Regia Accademia delle Belle Arti in Venice. During the 1920s, while very young, he started a collaboration with the Murano glassworks and he started practicing as architect and teaching at Venice’s Regio Istituto Superiore di Architettura (later IUAV), activity which he will continue throughout all his career. His first completed project was the restoration of the Ca’ Foscari University seat (1937), where he demonstrated a great capability in redefining the inner spaces and a great sensitivity in the use of materials, a quality that will be present in all his future work. He was constantly involved in exhibition arrangement projects, especially for the Venice Biennale and the city’s permanent collections: although later modified by others, his work on the Gallerie dell’Accademia and the Museo Correr are still milestones in the history of museum outfitting on an international level, as are those in the Gipsoteca in Possagno and in Palazzo Abatellis in Palermo. Many of his choices in outfitting projects stem from his intense relationship with works of art, both antique and contemporary. He was always capable of highlighting the individuality of every piece, even when confronting different contexts, as he did with his Olivetti project in Piazza San Marco, in Venice. From the early 1970’s, Scarpa’s name imposed itself on the national scene, although his work was always marked by a deeply personal characterisation and a profound detachment from the themes that mark the work of many of his contemporaries. In the world of exhibition arrangements and museum outfitting, he cut out for himself an autonomous dimension directed towards remote contexts of time and space – as witnessed by his interest for Far Eastern civilisations. The greatest and most challenging project of his adult years was the renovation of the Museo di Castelvecchio in Verona. This project provided for a number of interventions on the different architectural bodies of the Scaliger castle; here Scarpa elaborated extraordinary solutions and designed an outfitting that marked the history of 20th century international museology. Over time, materials and construction processes became one of his richest research fields and steel and concrete allowed him to create some of his most originals interpretations of the building
methods of the time.

Courtesy Fondazione MAXXI
Photo by Mario Toselli, 1972