After the Fall – the Enduring Traces of Fascism in Contemporary Rome
A presentation by Flavia Marcello in conversation with Nick Carter

The Italian Cultural Institute is pleased to host on 30 May 2024 at 6.00 pm, the presentation of the essay After the Fall – the Enduring Traces of Fascism in Contemporary Rome written by Flavia Marcello, Professor of Architecture at Swinburne Univeristy in Adelaide, in conversation with Prof. Nick Carter of the Australian Catholic University of Sydney, Marcello will explore the how, where and why of fascist traces in the contemporary city – from its buildings, monuments and squares, to street names and graffiti. It will reveal how the legacy of this brief historical period has shaped – and continues to shape – Rome's contemporary urban landscape in significant ways. It will also examine what this can tell us about the persistence of troubling political and historical legacies in the built environment.

Italy's fascist period (1922-1943) is the least-understood episode of Rome's architectural history yet it has defined our view of its world-famous ancient, Renaissance, and Baroque urban landscapes more than any other. After the Fall examines how the fascist regime sought to remake Rome according to its own vision of the past, and surveys the afterlife of Mussolini's architectural and urban projects.

Internationally, there is currently much debate on the controversial status of public monuments - their abandonment, defacement, re-integration or removal - and, as After the Fall demonstrates, Rome provides a rich setting in which to examine these topical, pressing questions. Adding a new chapter to the architectural history of Rome, this fascinating history brings architecture, politics, and art together as living, contested experiences in a host of different locations around contemporary Rome.

Flavia Marcello is Professor of Architecture at Swinburne University and current president of the Society of Architectural Historians of Australia and New Zealand. In 2022 she was the Balsdon Fellow at the British School in Rome. She is a world expert on the art, architecture and design of the Italian Fascist and post-war periods and has published numerous articles in leading journals. Her research delves the politics of monuments and public space, the legacy of Fascism in contemporary society and the creative outputs of Italian prisoners of war in Australia during World War II. She is author of two books: a monograph on Italian-Istrian architect Giuseppe Pagano-Pogatschnig that looks at the relationship between design and social change (Intellect, 2020) and the legacy of Fascism in contemporary Rome (Bloomsbury, 2024).

Nick Carter is Professor of Modern History at Australian Catholic University in Sydney. He is a specialist in 19th and 20th century Italian history and is the author of Modern Italy in Historical Perspective (Bloomsbury Academic, 2010) and editor of Britain, Ireland and the Italian Risorgimento (Palgrave, 2015). He has written extensively on the monumental artistic and architectural legacies of Fascism in postwar and contemporary Italy, most recently in the Journal of Contemporary History (2024). Carter is also associate editor of the journal Modern Italy.