baroque architecture
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A Research on Architectural Styles Trough Out The Agesby Einstein Schwartz Gaspar Maulad; Baroque architecture is the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late 16th-century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and the absolutist state.TRANSCRIPT
BAROQUE ARCHITECTURE
A Research on Architectural Styles Trough Out The Ages
by Einstein Schwartz Gaspar Maulad
BAROQUE
Baroque architecture is the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late 16th-century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and the absolutist state. It was characterized by new explorations of form, light and shadow and dramatic intensity.
Whereas the Renaissance drew on the wealth and power of the Italian courts and was a blend of secular and religious forces, the Baroque was, initially at least, directly linked to the Counter-Reformation, a movement within the Catholic Church to reform itself in response to the Protestant Reformation. Baroque architecture and its embellishments were on the one hand more accessible to the emotions and on the other hand, a visible statement of the wealth and power of the Church. The new style manifested itself in particular in the context of the new religious orders, like the Theatines and the Jesuits who aimed to improve popular piety.
BAROQUE
The architecture of the High Roman Baroque can be assigned to the papal reigns of Urban VIII, Innocent X and Alexander VII, spanning from 1623 to 1667. The three principal architects of this period were the sculptor Gianlorenzo Bernini, Francesco Borromini and the painter Pietro da Cortona and each evolved their own distinctively individual architectural expression. Dissemination of Baroque architecture to the south of Italy resulted in regional variations such as Sicilian Baroque architecture or that of Naples and Lecce. To the north, the Theatine architect Camillo-Guarino Guarini, Bernardo Vittone and Sicilian born Filippo Juvarra contributed Baroque buildings to the city of Turin and the Piedmont region.A synthesis of Bernini, Borromini and Cortona’s architecture can be seen in the late Baroque architecture of northern Europe which paved the way for the more decorative Rococo style.
BAROQUE
By the middle of the 17th century, the Baroque style had found its secular expression in the form of grand palaces, first in France—with the Château de Maisons (1642) near Paris by François Mansart—and then throughout Europe. During the 17th century, Baroque architecture spread through Europe and Latin America, where it was particularly promoted by the Jesuits. Château de Maisons by
François Mansart
BAROQUE CHARACTER
Michelangelo's late Roman buildings, particularly St. Peter's Basilica, may be considered precursors to Baroque architecture. His pupil Giacomo della Porta continued this work in Rome, particularly in the façade of the Jesuit church Il Gesù, which leads directly to the most important church façade of the early Baroque, Santa Susanna (1603), by Carlo Maderno.St. Peter’s Basilica by
Michelangelo
BAROQUE CHARACTER
Santa Susanna by Carlo Maderno
Gesù by Giacomo della Porta
BAROQUE CHARACTER
The interior is a shell for painting, sculpture and stucco (especially in the late Baroque)
Naves being the main body of the church and which provides the central approach to the
high altar are usually broader and sometimes given oval forms
Dramatic use of light; either strong light-and-shade contrasts (chiaroscuro effects) or uniform
lighting by means of several windows
Opulent use of color and ornaments (putti or figures made of wood (often gilded), plaster or
stucco, marble or faux finishing)
Large-scale ceiling frescoes
Illusory effects like trompe l'oeil (an art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in
order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects appear in three dimensions.) and the
blending of painting and architecture
The external façade is often characterized by a dramatic central projection.
Pear-shaped domes in the Bavarian, Czech, Polish and Ukrainian Baroque
BAROQUE CHARACTER
A Church’s Nave A Painting Using the Chiaroscuro Effect
BAROQUE CHARACTER
Stucco Finishing on a Wall Faux Finishes
BAROQUE CHARACTER
A Painting Using the Trompe l'oeil Effect
A Frescoe on the Ceiling of a Particular Church
BAROQUE
Though the tendency has been to see Baroque architecture as a European phenomenon, it coincided with, and is integrally enmeshed with, the rise of European colonialism. Colonialism required the development of centralized and powerful governments with Spain and France, the first to move in this direction. Colonialism brought in huge amounts of wealth, not only in the silver that was extracted from the mines in Bolivia, Mexico and elsewhere, but also in the resultant trade in commodities, such as sugar and tobacco. The need to control trade routes, monopolies, and slavery, which lay primarily in the hands of the French during the 17th century, created an almost endless cycle of wars between the colonial powers: the French religious wars, the Thirty Years' War (1618 and 1648), Franco–Spanish War (1653), the Franco-Dutch War (1672–1678), and so on.
BAROQUE
The initial mismanagement of colonial wealth by the Spaniards bankrupted them in the 16th century (1557 and 1560), recovering only slowly in the following century. This explains why the Baroque style, though enthusiastically developed in Spain, was to a large extent, in Spain, an architecture of surfaces and façades, unlike in France and Austria where we see the construction of numerous huge palaces and monasteries. In contrast to Spain, the French, under Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–1683), the minister of finance, had begun to industrialize their economy, and thus, were able to become, initially at least, the benefactors of the flow of wealth. While this was good for the building industries and the arts, the new wealth created an inflation, the likes of which had never been experienced before. Rome was known just as much for its new sumptuous churches as for its vagabonds.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
A number of ecclesiastical buildings of the Baroque period in Rome had plans based on the Italian paradigm of the basilica with a crossed dome and nave, but the treatment of the architecture was very different to what had been carried out previously. One of the first Roman structures to break with the Mannerist conventions exemplified in the Gesù, was the church of Santa Susanna, designed by Carlo Maderno. The dynamic rhythm of columns and pilasters, central massing, and the protrusion and condensed central decoration add complexity to the structure. There is an incipient playfulness with the rules of classic design, but it still maintains rigor.The same concerns with plasticity, massing, dramatic effects and shadow and light is evident in the architectural work of Pietro da Cortona, illustrated by his design of Santi Luca e Martina(construction began in 1635) with what was probably the first curved Baroque church facade in Rome. These concerns are even more evident in his reworking of Santa Maria della Pace (1656-1658). The facade with its chiaroscuro half-domed portico and concave side wings, closely resembles a theatrical stage set and the church facade projects forward so that it substantially fills the tiny trapezoidal piazza. Other Roman ensembles of the Baroque and Late Baroque period are likewise suffused with theatricality and, as urban theatres, provide points of focus within their locality in the surrounding cityscape.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Santi Luca e Martina by Pietro da Cortona
Santa Maria della Pace by Pietro da Cortona
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Probably the most well known example of such an approach is Saint Peter's Square, which has been praised as a masterstroke of Baroque theatre. The piazza, designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, is formed principally by two colonnades of free standing columns centered on an Egyptian obelisk. Bernini's own favorite design was his oval church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale decorated with polychrome marbles and an ornate gold dome. His secular architecture included the Palazzo Barberini based on plans by Maderno and the Palazzo Chigi-Odescalchi (1664), both in Rome.
Bernini's rival, the architect Francesco Borromini, produced designs that deviated dramatically from the regular compositions of the ancient world and Renaissance. His building plans were based on complex geometric figures, his architectural forms were unusual and inventive and he employed multi-layered symbolism in his architectural designs. Borromini's architectural spaces seem to expand and contract when needed, showing some affinity with the late style of Michelangelo. His iconic masterpiece is the diminutive church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, distinguished by a complicated plan arrangement that is partly oval and partly a cross and so has complex convex-concave wall rhythms. A later work, the church of Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, displays the same playful inventiveness and antipathy to the flat surface, epitomized by an unusual “corkscrew” lantern above the dome.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Saint Peter's Square Sant'Andrea al Quirinale by Gian Lorenzo Bernini
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Palazzo Barberini Palazzo Chigi-Odescalchi
ITALIAN BAROQUE
San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Following the death of Bernini in 1680, Carlo Fontana emerged as the most influential architect working in Rome. His early style is exemplified by the slightly concave façade of San Marcello al Corso. Fontana's academic approach, though lacking the dazzling inventiveness of his Roman predecessors, exerted substantial influence on Baroque architecture both through his prolific writings and through a number of architects he trained, who would disseminate the Baroque idioms throughout 18th-century Europe.The 18th century saw the capital of Europe's architectural world transferred from Rome to Paris. The Italian Rococo, which flourished in Rome from the 1720s onward, was profoundly influenced by the ideas of Borromini. The most talented architects active in Rome—Francesco de Sanctis (Spanish Steps, 1723) and Filippo Raguzzini (Piazza Sant'Ignazio, 1727)—had little influence outside their native country, as did numerous practitioners of the Sicilian Baroque, including Giovanni Battista Vaccarini, Andrea Palma, and Giuseppe Venanzio Marvuglia.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
The last phase of Baroque architecture in Italy is exemplified by Luigi Vanvitelli's Caserta Palace, reputedly the largest building erected in Europe in the 18th century. Indebted to contemporary French and Spanish models, the palace is skillfully related to the landscape. At Naples and Caserta, Vanvitelli practiced a sober and classicizing academic style, with equal attention to aesthetics and engineering, a style that would make an easy transition to Neoclassicism.
In the north of Italy, the monarchs from the House of Savoy were particularly receptive to the new style. They employed a brilliant triad of architects—Guarino Guarini, Filippo Juvarra, and Bernardo Vittone—to illustrate the grandiose political ambitions and the newly acquired royal status of their dynasty. Guarini was a peripatetic monk who combined many traditions (including that of Gothic architecture) to create irregular structures remarkable for their oval columns and unconventional façades. Building upon the findings of contemporary geometry and stereometry, Guarini elaborated the concept of architectura obliqua, which approximated Borromini's style in both theoretical and structural audacity. Guarini's Palazzo Carignano (1679) may have been the most flamboyant application of the Baroque style to the design of a private house in the 17th century.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Fluid forms, weightless details, and the airy prospects of Juvarra's architecture anticipated the art of Rococo. Although his practice ranged well beyond Turin, Juvarra's most arresting designs were created for Victor Amadeus II of Sardinia. The visual impact of his Basilica di Superga (1717) derives from its soaring roof-line and masterful placement on a hill above Turin. The rustic ambiance encouraged a freer articulation of architectural form at the royal hunting lodge of the Palazzina di Stupinigi (1729). Juvarra finished his short but eventful career in Madrid, where he worked on the royal palaces at La Granja and Aranjuez. Among the many who were profoundly influenced by the brilliance and diversity of Juvarra and Guarini, none was more important than Bernardo Vittone. This Piedmontese architect is remembered for an outcrop of flamboyant Rococo churches, quatrefoil in plan and delicate in detailing. His sophisticated designs often feature multiple vaults, structures within structures and domes within domes.
ITALIAN BAROQUE
San Marcello al Corso by Carlo Fontana
Caserta Palace by Luigi Vanvitelli
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Palazzo Carignano by Guarino Guarini
Basilica di Superga by Juvarra
ITALIAN BAROQUE
Palazzina di Stupinigi by Juvarra
SPANISH BAROQUE
As Italian Baroque influences penetrated across the Pyrenees, they gradually superseded in popularity the restrained classicizing approach of Juan de Herrera, which had been in vogue since the late 16th century. As early as 1667, the façades of Granada Cathedral (by Alonso Cano) and Jaén Cathedral (by Eufrasio López de Rojas) suggest the artists' fluency in interpreting traditional motifs of Spanish cathedral architecture in the Baroque aesthetic idiom. The most impressive display of Churrigueresque spatial decoration may be found in the west façade of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.In contrast to the art of Northern Europe, the Spanish art of the period appealed to the emotions rather than seeking to please the intellect. The Churriguera family, which specialized in designing altars and retables, revolted against the sobriety of the Herreresque classicism and promoted an intricate, exaggerated, almost capricious style of surface decoration known as the Churrigueresque. Within half a century, they transformed Salamanca into an exemplary Churrigueresque city. Among the highlights of the style, the interiors of the Granada Charterhouse offer some of the most impressive combinations of space and light in 18th-century Europe. Integrating sculpture and architecture even more radically, Narciso Tomé achieved striking chiaroscuro effects in his Transparente for theToledo Cathedral.
SPANISH BAROQUE
Granada Cathedral by Alonso Cano
Granada Charterhouse Interior
SPANISH BAROQUE
The development of the style passed through three phases. Between 1680 and 1720, the Churriguera popularized Guarini's blend of Solomon columns and composite order, known as the "supreme order". Between 1720 and 1760, the Churrigueresque column, or estipite, in the shape of an inverted cone or obelisk, was established as a central element of ornamental decoration. The years from 1760 to 1780 saw a gradual shift of interest away from twisted movement and excessive ornamentation toward a neoclassical balance and sobriety.
Two of the most eye-catching creations of Spanish Baroque are the energetic façades of the University of Valladolid (Diego Tomé, 1719) and Hospicio de San Fernando in Madrid (Pedro de Ribera, 1722), whose curvilinear extravagance seems to herald Antonio Gaudí and Art Nouveau. In this case as in many others, the design involves a play of tectonic and decorative elements with little relation to structure and function. The focus of the florid ornamentation is an elaborately sculptured surround to a main doorway. If we remove the intricate maze of broken pediments, undulating cornices, stucco shells, inverted tapers, and garlands from the rather plain wall it is set against, the building's form would not be affected in the slightest.
SPANISH BAROQUE
The combination of the Native American and Moorish decorative influences with an extremely expressive interpretation of the Churrigueresque idiom may account for the full-bodied and varied character of the Baroque in the American colonies of Spain. Even more than its Spanish counterpart, American Baroque developed as a style of stucco decoration. Twin-towered façades of many American cathedrals of the 17th century had medieval roots and the full-fledged Baroque did not appear until 1664, when a Jesuit shrine on Plaza des Armas in Cusco was built. Even then, the new style hardly affected the structure of churches.
To the north, the richest province of 18th-century New Spain—Mexico—produced some fantastically extravagant and visually frenetic architecture known as Mexican Churrigueresque. This ultra-Baroque approach culminates in the works of Lorenzo Rodriguez, whose masterpiece is the Sagrario Metropolitano in Mexico City. Other fine examples of the style may be found in remote silver-mining towns. For instance, the Sanctuary at Ocotlán (begun in 1745) is a top-notch Baroque cathedral surfaced in bright red tiles, which contrast delightfully with a plethora of compressed ornament lavishly applied to the main entrance and the slender flanking towers.
SPANISH BAROQUE
University of Valladolid by Diego Tomé
Mexican Churrigueresque
SPANISH BAROQUE
The true capital of Mexican Baroque is Puebla, where a ready supply of hand-painted ceramics (talavera) and vernacular gray stone led to its evolving further into a personalized and highly localized art form with a pronounced Indian flavor. There are about sixty churches whose façades and domes display glazed tiles of many colors, often arranged in Arabic designs. The interiors are densely saturated with elaborate gold leaf ornamentation. In the 18th century, local artisans developed a distinctive brand of white stucco decoration, named "alfenique" after a Pueblan candy made from egg whites and sugar.The Peruvian Baroque was particularly lavish, as evidenced by the monastery of San Francisco at Lima (1673). While the rural Baroque of the Jesuit Block and Estancias of Córdoba in Córdoba, Argentina, followed the model of Il Gesu, provincial "mestizo" (crossbred) styles emerged in Arequipa, Potosí, and La Paz. In the 18th century, architects of the region turned for inspiration to the Mudéjar art of medieval Spain. The late Baroque type of Peruvian façade first appears in the Church of Our Lady of La Merced in Lima. Similarly, the Church of La Compañia in Quito suggests a carved altarpiece with its richly sculpted façade and a surfeit of spiral salomónica.
SPANISH BAROQUE
Monastery of San Francisco at Lima
Mudéjar art
SPANISH BAROQUE
Church of Our Lady of La Merced in Lima
Church of La Compañia in Quito
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