Biography
Jean Marc Schivo
Member of “Ordine degli Architetti di Roma” and “Ordre des Architectes Paris - Ile de France”.
Since 2001 he has been teaching as professor in charge for the Degree Course of “Interior Design I” at the Faculty of Architecture “Valle Giulia” in Rome.
The architect Jean Marc Schivo was born in 1949 in Toulon (France), where he spent his childhood. When he was a 17 years old, he began his athletics career. He achieved important results in high jump ended with the participation at the Olympic Games in 1972 in Munich.
He studied at the Faculty of Architecture “Valle Giulia” in Rome, where he graduated under the tutorship of Bruno Zevi, with who he began a collaboration just after his degree, working on the research about the architectonic communication. His friendships and his relationships collaboration with some important personalities such as Corrado Cagli, Sergio Musmeci, Luigi Pellegrin, Jean Prouvé, Claude Parent, André Woghenskj, Ionel Schein have marked, in different ways, his idea of architecture and the way to communicate it immediately through the drawing. His professional activity is divided in designing different series of structures such as: sport facilities, museums, multifunctional and commercial centers, dwelling units, transport networks, structural elements. In 1991 he found with Lucilla Revelli the “Studio Schivo e Associati”, that in 2006 would become “J. M. Schivo & Associati s.r.l.”, now “JM Schivo & Partners”.
Lucilla Revelli
1983, degree in architecture, University of Rome – La Sapienza.
Member of “Ordine degli Architetti di Roma”; Bio-Architecture and Landscape Architecture specialist.
In 1991 she co-founded with Jean Marc Schivo the “Studio Schivo e Associati”, that in 2006 would become “J.M. Schivo & Associati s.r.l.”, now “J. M. Schivo & Partners”.
Since 2001 she has been a teaching assistant at the Faculty of Architecture “Valle Giulia”, Degree Course in Interior Design, at the University of Rome – La Sapienza.
In 2006 she becomes an associate member of “J.M. Schivo & Associati s.r.l.” with the assignment of sole director of the company.
She collaborates on the Studio projects and contributes to l’Arca International magazine.
Passion and Rigour
Jean Marc Schivo, who now teaches in the Valle Giulia Faculty of Architecture, only decided to enroll at uni-versity when he was twenty-three years old; until then, as his biography states, he had been a devoted sportsman, actually achieving excellent results even at international standard.
He has always shown the same passion and precision when first studying architecture, then working profes-sionally, and now teaching the Faculty.
Having learnt his trade on our campus, he is a very original example of the creative artistry and pragmatism that can only be achieved after truly taking on the cultural legacy of masters such as those who have taught at the Faculty.
Prominent amongst these great teachers is unquestionably Bruno Zevi, who he worked with until 1983, de-veloping an interesting line of experimentation in the field of architectural communication.
Zevi himself acknowledge Schivo’s distinctly cosmopolitan cultural background resulting from all his frequent trips abroad; such wide cultural horizons brought him into contact with the most prestigious architecture firms, where he worked with such outstanding professionals as Sergio Musmeci, Luigi Pellegrin and Andrè Woghenskj, one of Le Corbusier’s assistants.
Thanks to the way he has successfully combined professional training in architecture and scientific studies, Schivo has shown a real flair for analyzing problems on both a theoretical and practical level. This is why he has managed to provide a notable contribute to solving typical problems associated with architectural design, such as the relations of human artifice to the natural environment in which they are set, always working along totally innovative lines.
He has not adopted the approach of blending architecture into the landscape trought contextual camouflag-ing, preferring instead to search for a deeper sense of harmony between people and the environment, with-out making them overlap. He is always looking for a careful balance that respect their relative identities and distinctive traits.
In this respect, his project for the International Observatory for a protecting cetaceans to be built in Imperia is particularly emblematic. Its zoomorphological form provides the means to actively empathise with the design.
Finally, it shows the ability to find a new synthesis, in some senses quite unorthodox and being the result of thousands of years of research: human experimentation into a type of space that is different from the natural world, but at the same time incorporated in it and in harmony with it: an authentic interpenetration of both natural and artificial elements lightened up thanks to progress in new building technology.
Roberto Palumbo
Dean of the Faculty of Architecture “Valle Giulia” in Rome