The architect Italo Rota, who designed, among other things, the Museo del Novecento in Piazza Duomo in Milan, died in Milan on Saturday 6 April at the age of 70. In Modena he is known for having created – together with his colleague Carlo Ratti of the design and innovation studio CRA, the professor of architectural restoration Francesco Doglioni and the Polytechnic Society – the masterplan of the new cultural center AGO Modena Fabbriche Culturali, one of the most important cultural projects and significant in recent years at a national level.
The master plan – for an area of over 22 thousand square meters – will return to the former Estense capital an imposing place, transformed into a cultural production laboratory, which will host numerous institutions capable of working in an interdisciplinary manner: the Modena Visual Arts Foundation, the Museums University, the Figurine Museum, as well as the Interdepartmental Research Center on Digital Humanities DHMoRe and the international center for innovative teaching Future Education Modena, which are already based here.
Ex Sant’Agostino, the final project revealed. Kinetic coverage and internal road
Who was Italo Rota
One of the most interesting and multifaceted figures on the Italian architectural scene, Italo Rota graduated in 1982 from the Polytechnic of Milan, training first in the studio of Franco Albini and later in that of Vittorio Gregotti. At the end of the eighties, he moved to Paris, where he designed the renovation of the Museum of Modern Art at the Center Pompidou with Gae Aulenti, the new rooms of the French school at the Cour Carré of the Louvre, the lighting of the Notre Dame cathedral and along the Seine and the renovation of the center of Nantes.
In addition to France, there are numerous works created internationally, such as the Casa Italiana at Columbia University, New York (1997); the Hindu Temple in Mumbai (2009); the Chameleon Club at Byblos Hotel, Dubai (2011).
