Character of Renaissance ArchitectureMoore, Charles Herbert
History
Character of Renaissance Architecture
Moore, Charles Herbert
Architecture, Renaissance
But before we examine the church architecture of the Lombard and
Venetian Renaissance, one small building of exceptional character in
central Italy is worthy of special notice, namely, the façade of the
church of San Bernardino of Perugia, dating from the second half of the
fifteenth century. This work is remarkable for delicate workmanship,
and affords a rare instance of the use of colour in the architecture
of the Renaissance. It is made up of red and white marble, with points
of dark green and turquoise blue, arranged with quiet harmony of
effect. But it is a combination of members put together with no regard
to structural consistency. The designer appears to have had not the
slightest idea that arches and columns, pilasters and entablatures,
have any meaning save as elements of abstract ornamental composition
to be played about according to his fancy. The front (Plate V) is an
upright rectangle, crowned with an entablature and a low pediment. A
broad pilaster is set on each angle, and the space between is filled
with a wide and deep recess having a splayed arch reaching to the
entablature on splayed jambs. A smaller entablature at the arch impost
crosses the entire front, breaking around the jambs and pilasters,
and dividing it into two nearly equal parts. The smaller details
consist of panellings and medallions in the splays of the jambs and
archivolts, of sculptured reliefs on the tympanum and on the panels,
and of shafted and gabled niches sheltering statues on the pilasters.
The panels of the splays are flanked with diminutive pilasters which
are superimposed with only a narrow fillet between those below and
those which rest upon them, and the ornamental framing of the niches is
made up of colonnettes carrying rectangular stilt-blocks on which small
pediments are set. The elaborate richness of this façade is unusual in
the Renaissance architecture of central Italy, except in the smaller
compositions of tombs and pulpits, which in treatment it resembles. But
profusion of ornament is a marked characteristic of the architecture
of the Renaissance in north Italy, to which we may now turn. In Milan
and Venice the neo-classic influences were, even more than in Florence
and Rome, confined to ornamental details, and in these details the
designers of the North had still less regard for classic correctness
and consistency than those of central Italy had shown; while the larger
structural forms of their buildings still remained essentially Lombard
and Venetian. Much of the architecture of the North was, it is true,
the work of architects from central Italy, but these architects were
so far influenced by local tastes and conditions as to produce designs
very different in character from those of Florence or of Rome.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account