Into the De/Construction of the Psychiatric Space

The deconstruction of the psychiatric space is the answer to the implementation of Law 180 in 1978, which decreed the closure of mental hospitals in Italy. This chapter provides an overview of the cultural context and the intellectual background that underpinned this, by means of architectural, social, and cultural analysis. It focuses on the interrelationship between French post-structuralism (especially Foucault’s work) and architectural criticism. The fil rouge is the 1977 book Il dispositivo Foucault, which, through a cross-reading of architecture by philosophers and historians working at the IUAV in Venice, unravels the connection between Foucault’s rupture of discourse and the shattering of the psychiatric space, interpreting it as a relapse in the relationship between architecture and society. By outlining the history of the psychiatric space, this chapter addresses the architectural meaning of the process of alienation and social marginalization across history and today.