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What can come from the concession given by the Municipality of Trieste to an ex-gas station?  We will find out on Thursday October 2nd 2008, at 6pm, when, after the architectural restructuring of the small building at the end of  the Rive di Trieste made possible by the Chamber of Commerce of Trieste,  the new STAZIONE ROGERS will open, named after the famous Italian architect Ernesto Nathan Rogers.  It will certainly be the most original center for cultural activities and information of the North East.

The building, which will contain the new  Triestine cultural structure, was designed in the early 1950s by the Milanese studio BBPR and is a small jewel of Italian contemporary architecture.
Among the members of the BBPR (a studio which also has to its credit the Torre Velasca, a symbol for Milan of its reconstruction and economic development) is the Triestine architect Ernesto Nathan Rogers, considered to be one of the theorists and founders of Italian contemporary architecture.
For the building destined to distribute gasoline “Aquila” in Trieste, E.N. Rogers conceived a unique spatial form: a light wave for the roofing, suspended on pilotis, a large quantity of glass for the three identical halls, juxtaposed by half-lengths, and the exclusive use of “brand” colors.  STAZIONE ROGERS will treasure this strong, marked characterization and will transform the distributor of fuel into a new distributor of culture, in preparation for the 2009 celebration  the 100th anniversary of the birth of the architect.

Four events, with the collaboration of universities, cultural and private  institutes, will mark the center’s activities for this coming autumn/fall.  Each one will operate a  hybridization/stratification of thematic areas suggested , on the one side, by current events, and, on the other, by the role of the touristic and commercial exchange point, a role which will now be destined to STAZIONE ROGER.
Objects, models, original designs and documents will be exhibited; on the screens and videos, programs of interactive information will be presented; periodically, informal talks (similar to a “revue parlee”) aimed at  a non-specialized public, will be offered;  guided tours, coffee breaks, food-tasting will be programmed on a monthly basis and accompanied by musical or literary exhibitions or “happenings”,   to indicate a relation with all that is contemporary in a way that is profound yet not boring , as is in the intellectual tradition of Trieste.

The first four events will each have a thematic color:  Blu Mare  (Blue Sea) to talk about the Sea Exhibition organized by Rogers in 1935 and the project for a future Sea Park which is now being studied in Trieste, promoted by the Chamber of Commerce.  Bianco Mistero (White Mystery) to show the results of the International Competition of Design Trieste Contemporanea, evocator of the Holy Grail in the setting  of an underground Trieste, place of occult gatherings and much disputed spirituality.  Verde Paesaggio (Green Landscape) to recount the grafting on  the caverns and on the underground rivers of the Carso, for a return to  the cultivation of grapevines and olive trees and of stone working, postulating a possible recovery of an environment which meets human needs.  Rosso Oriente (Red Orient) to observe the union between Central Europe and Japan through the Suez Canal, showing how on the same course as the ships of the Lloyd, not only did commercial exchange travel, but also cultural exchanges, fashion and the avant-garde.

INFO
www.stazionerogers.eu
+39 040 322 9416