L'histoire assassinée. Manfredo Tafuri and the architecture of the present

In recent years the work of Italian architectural historian Manfredo Tafuri has attracted a lot of interest in the world of architectural theory and practice. After the publications that celebrated Tafuri’s work immediately after his demise in 1994 - most notably, Casabella’s ‘The Historical Project of Manfredo Tafuri’ (1995)i - or produced a first collective critical reconsideration of his legacy shortly thereafter - seminal, ANY’s ‘Being Manfredo Tafuri’ (2000)ii -, the last few years have seen the publication of the English translation of Tafuri’s last book on the Renaissanceiii and of new studies on Tafuri’s works,iv which in different ways have returned Tafuri’s legacy to the forefront of the architectural debate.

The interest in Tafuri’s work had never entirely died off. Beyond the immediate applications of Tafuri’s historiographical method by his colleagues and students at the Department of Architectural History at the Institute of Architecture of the University of Venice (IUAV),v who continued his investigations in certain areas of research (for instance, the vast series of studies produced on the architecture of the Renaissance) and beyond the embracing of his critical ‘historical project’ in the ambit of recent architectural theory,vi Tafuri’s work on history as an open project and on the crisis of the architectural discipline has remained a constant point of reference for architectural practice as well.

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