In 1973, the foundation stone was laid for the unfinished hospital in Ripa Teatina, a small town in the Abruzzo hinterland. In the fifty years since, various completion attempts and demolition scenarios have succeeded each other, none of them implemented.

In its present state, the building is a looming presence but nearly absent from the collective gaze. In an attempt to bring the community closer together with the unfinished work on its own territory, the project is proposed as an opportunity to reactivate a process of imagination and construction of meanings around the unfinished building, via a large circular path outside the building and temporary safety interventions in its interior. The intervention is based on a gesture that is as concrete as it is evocative: the moving of earth, the mowing, and the creation of the 'satellite' and its crossing bring back to the surface sentimental artifacts to be deciphered - unexpected and symbolic objects to be given a place.

The experience in Ripa Teatina is synthesized at the Italian Pavilion through an object that evokes an archaic future, a sort of amulet based on the language and vision articulated by the unfinished work. Printing and engraving alternate, retracing the operations of removal and addition of the on-site material, tracing two interpretations of the project onto the two faces of the medallion, one graphic, the blueprint of the intervention, and one textual, the glossary of the most evocative terms. The two faces communicate via through-holes, corresponding to the geographic coordinates that form the basis of the traced external path named 'satellite'.

HPO

Founded by Alessandro Argentesi, Luca Cei, Mara Femia, Filippo Ferraro, Gregorio Giannini, Gabriele Giau, Giulio Marchetti, Oreste Montinaro, Dario Rizzi, Riccardo Simioni and Giorgio Scanelli, HPO is a community of architects based in Ferrara.
Through various scales of intervention and a collaborative and experimental attitude, it aims to demonstrate the non-obvious achievements of the architectural profession.

Claudia Durastanti

Claudia Durastanti is an Italian writer and translator. With La Straniera she was shortlisted for the 2019 Premio Strega and Premio Viareggio. The book has been translated into twenty-one languages and is being adapted into a television series. She holds a degree in Cultural Anthropology from the Sapienza University of Rome.

Practice
HPO (Alessandro Argentesi, Luca Cei, Mara Femia, Filippo Ferraro, Gregorio Giannini, Gabriele Giau, Giulio Marchetti, Oreste Montinaro, Dario Rizzi, Giorgio Scanelli, Riccardo Simioni)

Advisor

Claudia Durastanti

Incubator

Municipality of Ripa Teatina, MAXXI L'Aquila

Location

Ripa Teatina (Chieti), Abruzzo

Sponsors

Emoter Lavori srl, Retificio Ribola srl

Technical Consultants

Marco Cei

Icaro Ingegneria (Icaro Daniele)

Sigfrida (Federica Poggi, Paolo Vettorello)

Municipality of Ripa Teatina

Roberto Luciani (Mayor), Marco Ricciuti (Deputy Mayor), Mario Rispoli (Ufficio Tecnico – Servizio Lavori Pubblici), Massimo Serra (Councillor), Cinzia Marcello (Councillor)

Acknowledgements

Asl Chieti, Thomas Schael (Direttore generale Asl Chieti), Circolo L’oasi, Premio Rocky Marciano, Giancarlo Alfani, Emanuele Colanzi (Emoter Lavori srl), Francesco Dalmolin, Daniele D’Amario (Regione Abruzzo), Emanuele De Angelis, Irene De Vico Fallani,Giovanni Gibertini, Stefano Gobbi, Michele Millosevich, Gianmichele Panarelli, Giuseppe Valente, Pietro Vicentini, Emilio Zampacorta