Gianni Pettena (b. 1940) is an Italian architect, artist and critic, professor of History of Contemporary Architecture at the University of Florence and of Design at California State University, along with Archizoom, Superstudio and Ufo. He belongs to the original nucleus of the Italian radical architecture movement. Since the Seventies, his work and theoretical and experimental propositions, expressed in the form of design projects, interior design, architecture, museum installations and performances, has conversed and merged with the evolution of the world of the arts in a continuum of comparisons and participation in exhibits in museums and galleries. As critic and architecture historian, he has organised and prepared exhibits on the most important exponents of contemporary architecture and on the most significant schools of thought and trends in the sector. He re-proposed the themes of the ‘radicals’ in the exhibition entitled ‘Radicals. Architettura e Design 1960-1975‘ at the Venice Architecture Biennial in 1996 and in the subsequent exhibitions entitled ‘Archipelago’ (1999) and Radical Design (2004).
