Term used to describe the work of a group of young architects in Milan after World War I who responded to the post-war 'call to order' (see also NOVECENTO ITALIANO). The four original collaborators were GIOVANNI MUZIO, Mino Fiocchi (1893-1983), Emilio Lancia (1890-1973) and GIO PONTI, joined later by Aldo Andreani (1887-1971), GIUSEPPE DE FINETTI, Gigiotto Zanini, Piero Portaluppi (1888-1976), Pino Pizzigoni (1901-67) and others. Inspired by Milanese Neo-classicism, they proposed an architecture that would be recognizably Italian, although more disciplined than fin-de-si?cle Italian eclecticism. Their ideas were linked with the aims of metaphysical painters such as Giorgio de Chirico. Thus, unlike the Futurists, they favoured the symbolic use of historic elements, while admitting new concepts in spatial design and building technology at a practical level, although not as generators of form. Ideologically moderate, the protagonists of Novecentismo expressed themselves through buildings rather than the written or spoken word. Muzio was the most important and prolific of the Novecentismo architects, and his oeuvre characterizes the development of the movement.

See the Abbreviations for further details.

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