New Academy of Fine Arts

Project Objectives

The Galleries and the School of the Academy of Fine Arts coexisted in the same complex consisting of the Convent of Charity (Andrea Palladio, 1552), the Church of Charity and by the Great School of Saint Mary of Charity. At the beginning of the nineteenth century (from 1807 to 1811) the architect Gian Antonio Selva halved the space inside the church to use the upper part of it as exposition space and the ground-floor as an area for classrooms for the Academy of Fine Arts. The need for new exhibition space, for extra bathrooms as demanded by the Ronchey Act, for security and fire alarm systems for the Museum and the School, as well as the need to build appropriate classrooms and laboratories for the Academy School meant that teaching activities had to be transferred elsewhere. The Ministry for Cultural Works, in agreement with the Ministries of Clemency and Justice, Finance, Public Instruction and in collaboration with the Veneto Region and the Province and City of Venice, promoted the entire project and drafted a protocol of intent on March 14, 1997. It dealt with increasing the exhibition space in the Galleries and with restoring and adapting the large complex of the former Hospital for Incurable Diseases to be the new site of the Academy School.

The buildings that comprise the former hospital (covering a surface area of approximately 10,000 square meters) are arranged around a large cloister with columns and capitals in Istrian stone that date to the second half of the sixteenth century. The hospital’s large access door was originally made for a room in the Ducal Palace after the fire in 1577, but was donated by the city to the hospital and set in place by Antonio Da Ponte.

Contract:

European Contract Competition

Preliminary Project:

The preliminary project was drafted by architect Renata Codello and laid out the most important guidelines and characteristics in very detailed fashion while also explaining subsequent stages of planning. It defined:

• the functional articulation of various spaces in relation to the uses planned for them by the new Academy School of Fine Arts;
• the planning of structural work to be carried out;
• the planning of the buildings’ configuration and the way they will be adapted for safety purposes—keeping in mind at all times the primary objective of compromising the material integrity of the existing buildings as little as possible.

Work:

Subdivided in 2 sites, each with its own function. The first was begun on November 11, 1999 and finished on July 2, 2001. After the Office of Juvenile Justice was transferred to its new building in Mestre, the work at the second site was begun on July 1, 2002 and finished on December 5, 2003. The following projects were completed on the ground floor: the graphics and sculpture laboratories, the secretaries’ and professors’ offices, the library, the book storeroom, the lecture hall, the plaster-cast gallery, the special graphic techniques laboratory, the technical rooms and the bathrooms. On the second floor are the laboratories for painting, decoration, photography, scenery, didactics, architectural principles, ornamental modeling, as well as the balcony, other machinery and assorted necessary installations. On the third floor are the classrooms for artistic anatomy, mass media, planning methodology, school records and files, bathrooms and offices. The building’s systems include: cooling for the library, a proper ventilating system for the laboratories, and an appropriate arrangement for the computer cables used throughout the entire school.

• Final Inspection: Carried out on March 18, 2004. Financing: L. 27,280,000,000 equal to € 14,088,944.21 obtained by law on parcel # 622 on December 12, 1996.
• Solely in charge of Procedures:

Roberto Cecchi, Architect - up to May 2001

Stefano Filippi, Architect - up to April 2002

Giorgio Rossini, Architect - up through the termination of all work

Office Overseeing all Work:

• Job Director: Renata Codello, Architect

• Operations Director: Maurizio Delle Vedove, Surveyor
• Operations Director: Silvia Magnani, Assistant Technician
• Collaborators: Maddalena Montagner, Architect – Mr. Saverio Costantino
• Firm carrying out work: Associazione temporanea d’Imprese – S.a.c.a.ki.m. Primary group Proxy
• Coordinator of Safety: Gianni Breda, Engineer

  La New Academy of Fine Arts: Five Projects for the former Hospital for Incurable Diseases. Marsilio: December 2001.