Right now we are interested in Bramante's Tempietto Built by the church of San Pietro in Montorio, this small central-plan structure marks the spot where St. Peter is traditionally thought to have been martyred. Paid for by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, which is noteworthy here as a measure of the importance of the location. Date is a bit uncertain, but from the beginning of the 16th century.

Associations here: ancient Roman central-plan temple; central-plan mausoleum; martyrial shrine; evocation in size of reliquaries (these, remember, were small sculptures containing an important relic of a deceased saint or other type of holy person)

Design of exterior decoration as well as basic plan based on ancient Roman vocabulary, yet used here in non-ancient manner: the colonnade with the balustrade, for example.

Raphael and Bernini : Raphael's Architectural Interests and The Chigi Chapel, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome

"The unity of the arts": Raphael begins the study and practice of architecture later in life (dies in 1520 at the age of 37). He is involved with four projects of interest for the Baroque:

• The Villa Farnesina, Rome 1508-1511 Commissioned by Agostino Chigi, and formerly called the Villa Suburbina. Later bought by the Farnese family and they changed the name. Important for us is the type of the "suburban" villa--not in the city but not quite out in the country. (Think of this, perhaps, as what the track home once aspired to be, long ago...) The design of the villa is by Baldassare Peruzzi, a Sienese who has much greater success in Rome. The U-shaped design is thought perhaps to derive from a villa he built in Siena. Raphael worked with him and was responsible also for the decorative programs.
• Raphael's Loggia

• The Chigi Chapel in the church of Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome.

  Begun by Raphael for Agostino Chigi. Chigi intended it to be his funeral chapel; imperial imagery (pyramids), and enormous amounts of money spent on its construction and decoration indicate his ambitions. Unfortunately both Chigi and Raphael died in 1520, with the Chapel unfinished. It was boarded up and left essentially as it was until the arrival in Rome of Fabio Chigi, the great-nephew of Agostino and later to becom Pope Alexander VII.

  The Angel and Habbakuk By Bernini.

• The Villa Madama, Rome Villa Madama, Rome Begun ca. 1519.Built under the direction of Raphael, with assistance from Antonio da Sangallo the younger, Giulio Romano, and other important architects and artists. Patron was Giulio de'Medici, later to become Pope Clement VII. Work started in 1519; never finished (Web site is wrong on this); partially destroyed during the Sack of Rome in 1527, it was repaired but remains a fragment of the original project.

• Decoration of the Loggia Revival of Ancient Roman decorative styles: shell forms, mythological figures, study of remains of ancient houses prompts the development of the "grotesque" style--basically the lacy forms you can see here often shown with monstrous figures.

• Raphael as Archaeologist Just before he died, Raphael was beginning a project to trace and describe all of the remains of Ancient Rome. Raphael says in a letter that he was asked to do this by Pope Leo X, who himself died in 1521. Almost nothing was done.

Michelangelo and Capitoline Hill

Michelangelo in 1538 begins the renovation of Capitoline Hill--in Italian, the Campidoglio, seat of Roman government since antiquity. This is the first renovation of a public square in Rome, probably also since antiquity. This project, not quite finished by the time of Michelangelo's death in 1564, is the prototype in ambition if not design for many other such projects in the 17th century.

• Piazza del Campidoglio.
• Palazzo dei Conservatori Showing the Giant Order.

On to the Notes for Week 3

Back to the Notes for Week 1

Back to the Lecture Schedule