Mario Botta

“There is great mystery in a church. For me, there is a great privilege to be confronted with the design of a church because it shelters the most powerful themes of humanity: birth, marriage, death.”

“There's no point in us designing synthetic laboratories that could just as well be in Dusseldorf or Helsinki. San Francisco has its light, which must be used.”

“It was very useful to learn the history, the theory, and the art of building from a practical background.”

“Church architecture describes visually the idea of the sacred, which is a fundamental need of man.”

“In 1996, I took advantage of some favourable circumstances to propose to the state of the Ticino Canton the foundation of the Academy of Architecture and, with it, an Italian-speaking university in Switzerland.”

“The Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio comes from afar. Our land has a millennial history of emigrations: master masons, architects, builders, decorators, plasterers, artists from the world of building.”

“For me, architecture is not just creating a space to protect people but to make them dream as well.”

“Artificial light is used because you can control it better. Technically, it is more homogeneous, more delicate, and less damaging to artwork. But I think it's interesting when the visitor can see variations in the light, when it is not only technical or suitable.”

“The architect aspires to build in a city as the artist aspires to exhibit his works in a museum.”

“Buildings in modern cities have lost their metaphoric aspect. Much contemporary architecture is very fragmented and busy on the outside. It's like a skin or a skull, but you don't know what's inside.”

“I want to modernize the ancient. I prefer to work with materials formed naturally over thousands of years.”

“The architect works in the territory of memory.”

“Great architecture of the past was always clear. SFMOMA is still a simple building to understand.”

“A museum is a spiritual place. People lower their voices when they get close to art.”

“To me it was fascinating, the idea of going to university and studying a subject - architecture - that I had already faced in building some small houses.”

“I wanted to design a museum in which everything would seem clear.”