ANGELO PONTECORBOLI EDITORE

The second issue of Il Quaderno, the ISI Florence Architectural Journal is, in fact, the first of what we hope will be a long series.

For this reason, Ctrl+Z, the act of taking a step back, is not only the topic that I suggested to our architectural contributors but it is also a necessary condition to introduce Il Quaderno as the ISI Florence Architectural Journal, the number and the variety of contributions sent to us testify to this.
To all the responses that the CTRL+Z prompt triggered, we wish to add one further interpretation: taking a step back to go forward. The surprising escape strategy of a shrimp from a predator’s attack, or – even better – a choreography, that is, the arrangement of movements into a dance.
We want to use these two images as an auspicious interpretation to end this short introduction to Il Quaderno.
The shrimp is able both to swim forward by paddling with swimmerets on the underside of its abdomen and flick back quickly when in danger. I wish our journal the same lightness and rapidity (not by chance two of Calvino’s “six memos” for this millennium) as the shrimp to approach architectural education weightlessly yet effectively and rapidly change perspective on things.
Choreography, from the Greek words "χορεία" (circular dance) and "γραφή" (writing), is the art of arranging a number of dancers and make them move together (almost blend, one may say) in a harmonious sequence. To reach that harmony, both teachers and disciples (without a desk between them but in front of a mirror) endlessly rehearse and study their reflected images. It is precisely that mirror that our journal wants to become.