The telling of a spatial allegory: the Danteum as narrative labyrinth

Among the legacy of Modernist architecture, the Danteum project is an extraordinary attempt to inscribe a literary expedition into architectural organism. Beyond its absolute form, the project makes use of the plastic effects of architectonics to create immersive ‘atmospheres’ that elicit states of mind and transform the continuous movement through the scheme into a dramatised journey. The coexistence of immersion and progression provides competing challenges to visitors' narrative sensemaking. This paper will analyse the Danteum as a hybrid system of episodic and situational narrations that turns this geometrical space int o a narrative labyrinth.