La scuola torinese di Paolo Verzone e l'architettura bizantina nei fondi fotografici del Politecnico di Torino

Politecnico di Torino’s archives document over half a century of research and teaching activities by Paolo Verzone and his collaborators and students, between Italy and the territories of Asia Minor. The contribution deals with an examination of the archive and its organization and, through the re-reading of Verzone’s main writings, focuses on the construction of the iconographic support and the relationship between what has been published and the rich photographic documentation preserved. Engineer by training, Paolo Verzone (Vercelli 1902-Turin 1986) is a historian of ancient, medieval and Byzantine architecture, full professor since 1942 of Stylistic and constructive characters of monuments, director of the Institute of History of Architecture and from 1978 to 1986, professor emeritus at the Politecnico di Torino. Between 1951 and 1953 he was also in charge of the chair of History of architecture at the Teknik Üniversitesi in Istanbul and in 1957 he obtained from the Turkish government the concession for the excavation in the area of ancient Hierapolis, today Pamukkale, where he started the Italian Archaeological Mission of Hierapolis in Phrygia which he directed as head of mission until 1978. A long research and teaching activity that originated, at the Politecnico di Torino, a complex archive now inserted in the broader context of the historical collections of the University which count, only for the architecture documents, including the materials of which he wrote, 40 archival collections, part of academic training, part acquired by professionals and technical studies in Turin and Piedmont between the second half of the nineteenth century and the early 2000s. The collection of documents concerning Byzantium and Byzantine architecture is particularly rich; among this documentary material, photographs occupy an important position, also in consideration of Verzone’s particular familiarity with the photographic medium. As he sketches and notes with extraordinary skill, he photographs to the same extent, considering the shot as a document in all respects. This natural predisposition is associated with a particular attention to the material data, to the structural logic and to the knowledge of the urban context, all elements that make Paolo Verzone’s photographs a specific document, very far from the artistic shot.