Tag: Arabo-Norman architecture
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The bright glare of professionalism
We were welcomed to the (deep breath) Antonio Salinas Regional Archaeological Museum of Palermo by a dole of small turtles, lazing in the fountain in the entrance courtyard, to the great delight of Spawn. Clearly taking equal pleasure in the water and the sun, which they scaled one another to…
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History, re-mediated
‘Palazzo’ is a term that is bandied about quite casually in Italy, and although it is technically cognate with ‘palace’, it refers to any kind of grand residence, from the substantial townhouses of the prosperous bourgeoisie to the vast combined residences and governmental seats of dukes and bishops. The principal…
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Hybridity reified: a cosmopolitan architecture
Like the gardens of the Orto Botanico, the formal beds and pathways through which one approaches the facade of the Castello della Zisa are parched, dry and brown. They are not effaced by a chaos of growth, however, but scourged with an excess of order, a ground whose geometries are…
Oliver Arditi 