Vittorio Gregotti: The Anti-Empathic Architect

Luigi Prestinenza Puglisi's critical profile of Vittorio Gregotti, published on Artribune, portrays the Italian architect as an anti-empathic figure whose work reflects a rigid, factory-like discipline. Gregotti, born in 1927 and turning 90 on August 10, 2017, is best known for the Zen housing complex in Palermo, which Puglisi likens to a prison. The article traces Gregotti's formative years in his father's factory, as recounted in his 1996 autobiography 'Recinto di fabbrica' (Bollati Boringhieri). Puglisi argues that Gregotti's architecture embodies a lack of lightness, sensual detail, and bodily pleasure, comparing him unfavorably to contemporaries like Renzo Piano (born 1937), Bruno Zevi (1918), and Giancarlo de Carlo (1919). Despite his influence—as a professor, director of Casabella, and contributor to Corriere della Sera—Gregotti is depicted as a solitary figure who failed to promote talent, unlike Paolo Portoghesi. His theoretical works, such as 'Il territorio dell'architettura' (1972) and 'L'architettura nell'epoca dell'incessante', are criticized as convoluted. Puglisi concludes that Gregotti, a dinosaur of a bygone era, now evokes a certain nostalgia.