Purple Magazine
— The Island Issue #35 S/S 2021
la cupola
ARCHITECTURE
architect DANTE BINI
photography by VALERIE SADOUN
all images michelangelo antonioni and monica vitti’s house in sardinia
one of the most beautiful love affairs of italian cinema: director michelangelo antonioni fell for emerging star monica vitti in the late ’50s. they quickly became a celebrity couple, living the dolce vita and making three masterpieces together: l’avventura (1960), la notte (1961), and l’eclisse (1962).
while working on their new film, il deserto rosso (1964), the couple was offered a piece of land on the costa paradiso in northern sardinia. antonioni commissioned the avant-garde italian architect dante bini to build a concrete clifftop love bubble overlooking the sea of sardinia, but the relationship died before construction was completed.
the isolated, abandoned dome stands as a memento mori of their short-lived affair. it also evokes the impossibility of love, which antonioni tried to capture by filming a woman who always seems to vanish.
