PAOLO

SOLERI
Life,Works,Philosophy & Achievements

An Overview……
 Introduction
▪ Paolo Soleri (21 June 1919 – 9 April 2013) was an Italian architect,

urban designer, artist, craftsman, and philosopher.

▪ He established the educational Cosanti Foundation &Arcosanti.
▪ He was a National Design Award recipient in 2006.
▪ was awarded his Ph. D with highest honors in

architecture from the Torino Polytechnico in 1946.

▪ He spent 1 1/2year in fellowship with F.L.Wright in 1946 .

▪ During this time, he gained international recognition for

a bridge design that was displayed at the Museum of Modern Art.

▪ He is most noted for pioneering concepts in the fields of
environmental architecture and alternative urban planning
▪ Made his name as a countercultural icon and urban visionary.
▪ He coined the concept of ‘arcology’ – a synthesis of architecture

and ecology as the philosophy of democratic society

▪ Arcosanti, the prototype town in the Arizona desert

which embodied his ideals became his life's work,

which he founded in 1970
 Life Works
▪ His trademark is large scrolls, explorations of Arcology designs

done in pencil & crayon on large open-ended butcher paper,

typically (10 to 60 m) in length.
▪ His work also includes bronze and aluminum sculptures,pencil &

ink drawings,architectural models & thousands of sketches,

many self-bound in aluminum plates.
▪ He wrote The City in the Image of Man, in which the concept

of Arcology is oulined and illustrated with

astonishing graphics and rich details.
 Paolo Soleri Works
- The Lean Linear City Project, China, 2005
- Scottsdale Bridge Project, Arizona (USA), 1997
- Hyper Building project, Tokyo (Japan), 1996
- Glendale Community College Amphitheater, Arizona (USA), 1996
- Asteromo 94 – Model of spatial arcology, Tsu Mie Center of Arts (Japan), 1994
- Pedestrian bridge, Scottsdale, Arizona (USA), 1992
- Arcosanti 2000, 1991
- Rainbow Pulse Bridge for Bering Strait (Russia), 1988
- Santa Fe Amphitheater, Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA), 1966
- Plan for Mesa City, a city of 2 million people on 55 thousand acres in Manhattan, New York
(USA), 1963
- Establishment of the foundry and production of aluminium and bronze sculptures and
windbells, Cosanti, Paradise Valley, Arizona (USA), 1960-present
- Establishment of the studio and production of windbells, dishes, vases, bowls and lamps,
Cosanti, Paradise Valley, Arizona (USA), 1955-present
- Ceramic windbells, Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA), 1954
- Ceramica Artistica Solimene, Vietri sul Mare (Italy), 1953
- Artistic production of fabrics, papers and ceramics, Turin/Vietri sul Mare (Italy), 1950-1954
- Dome House, Cave Creek, Arizona (USA), 1949
- “The Beast” bridge design, 1949
Some Of Paolo’s Drawings
 What Is Arcology ?
▪ Arcologies, (mesa city)a fusion of Architecture and Ecology, were envisioned by Paolo Soleri in the 1960s and
70s as completely integrated megastructures, small cities in a single building of mammoth proportions.
▪ Living, working, shopping, agriculture, power generation, water purification, waste management and
transportation were all woven together in a fully three-dimensional marvel of engineering and architecture.
▪ Everything was recycled, nothing went to waste. Passive solar heating and natural cooling strategies were
often intrinsic to the overall form of the arcologies (apses to capture the warmth of the sun & ventilation cores
hundreds of feet high).
Marco Cosanti Design
 Cosanti
▪ He established his architecture studio in the 1950s and called it Cosanti,

a combination of two Italian words—cosa meaning "thing" and

anti meaning "against.
▪ By 1970, the Arcosanti experimental community was being developed
▪ Choosing to live simply, without material "things," is part of

the experiment of Arcosanti (architecture + cosanti)

▪ The community's design principles define the philosophy—

to set out to build a “Lean Alternative to hyper consumption

through a smartly efficient and elegant city design"
and to practice "elegant frugality."
Arcosanti
perched on a cliff, the crafts III building
contains apartments, a café and a visitor
center

The ceramics studio doubles as a stage

for performing arts & conference

Round window in arcosanti cafe frames

a balcony &view to the west
Hexadron Arcology
Two Suns Arcology
 Paolo’s Bridge Designs
▪ Paolo was very much fascinated with bridge designs and came up with a wide array of innovative concepts for
bridge structures.
▪ “Of all things that are man-made, bridges are, with dams, the most “structural,” single-minded, and imposing.
As connectors at a breaking point, they have a heroic force that is aided by a challenging structuralism.As a
strand of continuity in a non-continuum, the bridge is full of implied meanings. It is the opposite of
devisiveness, separation, isolation, irretrievability, loss, segregation, abandonment. To bridge is as cogent in
the psychic realm as it is in the physical world. The bridge is a symbol of confidence and trust. It is a
communications medium as much as a connector.”…………………………………………………………………………from
“The Sketchbooks of Paolo Soleri”, published by MIT Press, 1970
 This bridge is a tube – carved away where superfluous
&turned inside out at the pier.
 Its winged flanges are convex at the piers, then soar up and
over in a reverse curve to embrace the roadway at mid-span
Santa Fe Amphitheater
▪ The Paolo Soleri Amphitheater is an amphitheater in Santa Fe,
New Mexico, which was constructed in 1970 and closed in 2010.

The structure, which was never considered finished

▪ The amphitheater was built in Santa Fe in the late 1960s

▪ The concrete structure was created using Soleri’s

methods of earth-forming to create a type of desert-scape.

▪ The venue's wing-like, organic shapes emerge from a

bowl-shaped depression in the high desert floor.

▪ Soleri's design was influenced by Native American themes.

▪ Seating only about 650,

 The Paolo Soleri Amphitheater eschews
rectangularity.
 It has no proscenium and is mostly open to
the sky.
 Its weird shapes, especially the long,
embracing bridge and the “horned” upper
stage, suggest something like a living
presence.
 masterwork of earth-cast concrete

 The remarkable structure was “built down”

rather than built up from the ground

 The construction involved “silt-pile” earth-

forming techniques
 The long hill behind the theater was created
using the earth that was excavated to create
the bowl that holds the amphitheater and a
spectator arc of 2,000 seats
 While the theater is sprawlingly horizontal,
one of the compelling details of Soleri’s
design has to do with vertical orientations.
  Performers could access the upper stage in two ways

 Visible steps on both sides, just behind the main stage, lead
up through irregular openings in the cavelike shell — and
the two large, grooved columns behind stage center have
doorways facing away from the audience that permitted
actors to ascend unseen to the upper stage.

 Thus there are two grouped pairs of vertical passages, two

visible and two obscured, as Skinner describes them.

 He also recalls that vertical movement can signify

transformation in Native cosmology.

 The long hill behind the theater was created using the earth
that was excavated to create the bowl that holds the
amphitheater and a spectator arc of 2,000 seats.
 “Acknowledges the strength and beauty of
earth as a building material,”

It inspires a sense of sanctuary.

An important aspect of the Paolo Soleri is an

emergence point.

Interpreted by creating a physical

connection between the sculpture and a
point where the piece travels into the floor
of SITE Santa Fe.

This reminds us all of the connection we all

share to the ground below us.”

 “Embedding the bowl in the earth and opening the audience’s view to the mountains
beyond establish a connection between locale and the world beyond.”
 End..

NAME:K.SRI CHAANTHANA

ROLL NO:17SAR831