Pier Nicolò Berardi, costruttore di un paesaggio / Pier Nicolò Berardi, landscape constructor

Abstract

At the turn of the twentieth century, Italian architectural culture confronted the dialectic between historic and modern cities, reinterpreting classical canons to shape a renewed national identity. Within this context, Pier Niccolò Berardi (1904–1989) emerged as a key figure: after his participation in the S. M. Novella station competition (1932–35), he redefined his role as architect, painter, and photographer. The rise of Neorealism, particularly in Basilicata, promoted the rediscovery of rural traditions and the identification of modernity with “social time”. In Maratea, together with Stefano Rivetti, Berardi integrated villas, hotels, and farmhouses into the landscape, mobilizing an iconographic repertoire to construct a new cultural landscape. This process transformed Maratea into the “Pearl of the Tyrrhenian,” attracting capital and tourism while curbing migration. The investigation of these heterogeneous architectures not only outlines a specifically Italian path to Rationalism, but also interrogates their long-term socio-cultural, environmental, and economic repercussions, raising the question of whether a “Maratea model” exists as a framework for future territorial strategies.