Baroque architecture

Baroque architecture, architectural style originating in late 16th-century Italy

and lasting in some regions, notably Germany and colonial South America, until
the 18th century. It had its origins in the Counter-Reformation, when the Catholic
Church launched an overtly emotional and sensory appeal to the faithful
through art and architecture. Complex architectural plan shapes, often based on
the oval, and the dynamic opposition and interpenetration of spaces were
favoured to heighten the feeling of motion and sensuality. Other characteristic
qualities include grandeur, drama and contrast (especially in lighting),
curvaceousness, and an often dizzying array of rich surface treatments, twisting
elements, and gilded statuary. Architects unabashedly applied bright colours and
illusory, vividly painted ceilings. Outstanding practitioners in Italy included Gian
Lorenzo Bernini, Carlo Maderno, Francesco Borromini, and Guarino Guarini.
Classical elements subdued Baroque architecture in France. In central Europe,
the Baroque arrived late but flourished in the works of such architects as the
Austrian Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. Its impact in Britain can be seen in
the works of Christopher Wren. The late Baroque style is often referred to
as Rococo or, in Spain and Spanish America, as Churrigueresque.


Baldachin, St. Peter’s, Vatican City, by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, 1624–33
SCALA/Art Resource, New York

Baroque architecture
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Façade of the Church of the Gesù, the first truly baroque façade

Cupola frescoes of the Gesù by Gaulli

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. 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.[1] 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 Catholic
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.
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 his 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.
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.

Contents

Precursors and features of Baroque architecture[edit]

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.[2]
Distinctive features of Baroque architecture can include:

 in churches, broader naves and sometimes given oval forms

 fragmentary or deliberately incomplete architectural elements
 dramatic use of light; either strong light-and-shade contrasts (chiaroscuro effects) as at the
church of Weltenburg Abbey, or uniform lighting by means of several windows (e.g. church
of Weingarten Abbey)
 opulent use of colour and ornaments (putti or figures made of wood (often gilded), plaster or
stucco, marble or faux finishing)
 large-scale ceiling frescoes
 an external façade often characterized by a dramatic central projection
 the interior is a shell for painting, sculpture and stucco (especially in the late Baroque)
 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
 pear-shaped domes in the Bavarian, Czech, Polish and Ukrainian Baroque
 Marian and Holy Trinity columns erected in Catholic countries, often in thanksgiving for ending a
plague
Baroque and colonialism[edit]

During the Portuguese colonization of Goa, India brought about many churches with baroque architecture (Our Lady
of the Immaculate Conception Church).

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.[3] 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. 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 throughout the Spanish Empire, 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.[4]

Italy[edit]
Main articles: Italian Baroque and Italian Baroque architecture

Rome and Southern Italy[edit]

See also: Sicilian 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 from 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 façade
in Rome.[5] These concerns are even more evident in his reworking of Santa Maria della Pace (1656–
68). The façade with its chiaroscuro half-domed portico and concave side wings, closely resembles
a theatrical stage set and the church façade 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.
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 centred on an Egyptian obelisk.
Bernini's own favourite design was his oval church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale decorated with
polychome 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.

Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza by Francesco Borromini

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.
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.

Basilica di Superga near Turinby Filippo Juvarra

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.
Northern Italy[edit]
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.
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.

Malta[edit]
Main article: Maltese Baroque architecture
Reconstruction of the Wignacourt Arch, one of the earliest Baroque structures in Malta

The Baroque style was introduced in Malta in the early 17th century, possibly by the Bolognese
architect and engineer Bontadino de Bontadini, who was responsible for the construction of
the Wignacourt Aqueduct between 1612 and 1615. The earliest Baroque structures in Malta were
the decorative elements within the aqueduct, such as the Wignacourt Arch and several fountains.[6]

The High Baroque altar of Saint John's Co-Cathedral

Baroque architecture became popular after Francesco Bounamici designed the Church of the
Jesuitsin Valletta in 1635. In the subsequent decades, many churches, public buildings, city gates,
palaces and other structures were constructed or rebuilt in this style. New churches were built in the
Baroque style, while older ones were rebuilt or redecorated.[7] Examples include the interior of Saint
John's Co-Cathedral, which was completely redesigned by Mattia Preti in the 1660s, and the Church
of Our Lady of Victories, which had its façade rebuilt in 1752.
The architect Lorenzo Gafà designed many Baroque churches between the 1660s and the 1700s,
including the Church of St. Lawrence in Birgu (1681–97), St. Paul's Cathedral in Mdina (1696–1705)
and the Cathedral of the Assumption in Victoria, Gozo (1697–1711).[8]

Auberge de Castille

The most monumental Baroque building in Malta is Auberge de Castille, which was rebuilt in 1741–
45 by Andrea Belli.[7] Other examples of secular Baroque architecture in Malta include Hostel de
Verdelin (c. 1650s), parts of Fort Manoel(1723–33), the Mdina Gate (1724) and
the Castellania (1757–60).
The Baroque style remained popular in Malta until the late 18th and early 19th century, when
the neoclassical style was introduced. However, traditional Maltese architecture continued to have
significant Baroque influences.[7]

Spain[edit]
Main article: Spanish Baroque architecture

Royal Palace of La Granja

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 the Toledo Cathedral.

Facade of the University of Valladolid (1716-1718).

The development of the style passed through three phases. Between 1680 and 1720, the
Churriguera popularized Guarini's blend of Solomonic 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, 1716-1718) 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 America and territories[edit]

Catedral Metropolitana, Mexico City, started in 1573

Main articles: New Spanish Baroque and Andean 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.

Chapel of the Church of Santo Domingo, Puebla, Mexico

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 Metropolitanoin 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.[9]

Miagao Church, Iloilo, Philippines is a fine example of an Earthquake 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 personalised and highly
localised art form with a pronounced Indian flavour. There are about sixty churches whose façades
and domes display glazed tiles of many colours, 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.
Earthquake Baroque is a style of Baroque architecture found in the Philippines, which suffered
destructive earthquakes during the 17th century and 18th century, where large public buildings, such
as churches, were rebuilt in a Baroque style. Similar events led to the Pombaline architecture
in Lisbon following the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and Sicilian Baroque in Sicily following the 1693
earthquake.

Portugal and Portuguese Empire[edit]

Main article: Baroque architecture in Portugal

The Palace of Brejoeira, a prime example of northern Portuguese Baroque architecture

Mafra National Palace, a jewel of Portuguese Baroque architecture

The interior of the São Roque Church in Lisbon, Portugalillustrates the rich Baroque architecture in its chapels,
including the chapel of St. John the Baptist, adorned in gold, the most expensive in the world.

São Francisco de Assis Church, in the historic city of Ouro Preto, Brazil.

Nothwithstanding a prodigality of sensually rich surface decoration associated with Baroque

architecture of the Iberian Peninsula, the royal courts of Madrid and Lisbon generally favoured a
more sober architectural vocabulary distilled from 17th-century Italy. The royal palaces of Madrid, La
Granja, Aranjuez and Mafrawere designed by architects under strong influence of Bernini and
Juvarra. In the realm of church architecture, Guarini's design for Santa Maria della Divina
Providenza in Lisbon was a pace-setter for structural audacity in the region (even though it was
never built).
In Portugal, the first fully Baroque church was the Church of Santa Engrácia, in Lisbon, designed by
royal architect João Antunes, which has a Greek cross floorplan and curved facades. Antunes also
designed churches in which the inner space is rectangular but with curved corners (like the Menino
de Deus Church in Lisbon), a scheme that is found in several 18th-century churches in Portugal and
Brazil. The court of John V, on the other hand, favoured Roman baroque models, as attested by the
work of royal architect Ludovice, a German who designed the Royal Palace of Mafra, built after
1715.
By the mid-18th century, northern Portuguese architects had absorbed the concepts of Italian
Baroque to revel in the plasticity of local granite in such projects as the surging 75-metre-high Torre
dos Clérigosin Porto. The foremost centre of the national Baroque tradition was Braga, whose
buildings encompass virtually every important feature of Portuguese architecture and design. The
Baroque shrines and palaces of Braga are noted for polychrome ornamental patterns, undulating
roof-lines, and irregularly shaped window surrounds.
Brazilian architects also explored plasticity in form and decoration, though they rarely surpassed
their continental peers in ostentation. The churches of Mariana and the Rosario at Ouro Preto are
based on Borromini's vision of interlocking elliptical spaces. At São Pedro dos Clérigos, Recife), a
conventional stucco-and-stone façade is enlivened by "a high scrolled gable squeezed tightly
between the towers".
Even after the Baroque conventions passed out of fashion in Europe, the style was long practised in
Brazil by Aleijadinho, a brilliant and prolific architect in whose designs hints of Rococo could be
discerned. His church of Bom Jesus de Matozinhos at Congonhas is distinguished by a picturesque
silhouette and dark ornamental detail on a light stuccoed façade. Although Aleijadinho was originally
commissioned to design São Francisco de Assis at São João del Rei, his designs were rejected, and
were displaced to the church of São Francisco in Ouro Preto instead.

Kingdom of Hungary[edit]

Széchenyi Square of Győr, Hungary

In the Kingdom of Hungary, the first great Baroque building was the Jesuit Church of Trnava (today
in Slovakia) built by Pietro Spozzo in 1629–37, modelling the Church of the Gesu in
Rome. Jesuits were the main propagators of the new style with their churches in Győr (1634–
1641), Košice (1671–1684), Eger (1731–1733) and Székesfehérvár (1745–1751). The
reconstruction of the territories devastated by the Ottomans was carried out in Baroque style in the
18th century. Intact Baroque townscapes can be found
in Győr, Székesfehérvár, Eger, Veszprém, Esztergomand the Castle District of Buda. The most
important Baroque palaces in Hungary were the Royal Palace in Buda, Grassalkovich
Palace in Gödöllő, and Esterházy Palace in Fertőd. Smaller Baroque edifices of the Hungarian
aristocracy are scattered all over the country. Hungarian Baroque shows the double influence of
Austrian and Italian artistic tendencies as many German and Italian architects worked in the country.
The main characteristics of the local version of the style were modesty, lack of excessive decoration,
and some "rural" flavour, especially in the works of the local masters. Important architects of the
Hungarian Baroque were Andreas Mayerhoffer, Ignác Oraschek and Márton Wittwer. Franz Anton
Pilgram also worked in the Kingdom of Hungary, for example on the
great Premonstratensian monastery of Jasov (today in Slovakia). In the last decades of the 18th
century Neo-Classical tendencies became dominant. The two most important architects of that
period were Melchior Hefele and Jakab Fellner.
By the time Hungarian varieties of Baroque architecture appeared with several types of forms,
shapes and decorations. Those that have become famous and nice, have been copied. That's why
the Hungarian baroque edifices make groups based on similarities. The major kinds of buildings are
the following: Eszterháza-type, Széchenyi-type, Gödöllő-type, religious (ecclesiastical) baroque,
houses, and others (castles, peasant houses).
 

Grassalkovich Palace in Gödöllő (the Gödöllő-type)

Esterházy Palace in Fertőd(the Eszterháza-type)

Interior of Minorite church in Eger(ecclesiastical-type)

Parish Church of St. Anne in Budapest

 

The Primate's Palace and the Cathedral in Szombathely

Romania[edit]

St. George's Cathedral (built between 1736 and 1774) of Timişoara

Some representative Baroque structures in Romania are the Bánffy Palace in Cluj, the Brukenthal
Palace in Sibiu and the Bishopric Palace in Oradea. Besides, almost every Transylvanian town has
at least a Baroque church, the most representatives of which being St. George's
Cathedral of Timişoara, Saint John the Baptist Church of Târgu Mureş, the Holy Trinity
Cathedral of Blaj and the Piarist Church of Cluj.

France[edit]
Main articles: French Baroque and French Baroque architecture

Château de Maisons near Paris by François Mansart (1642)

The centre of Baroque secular architecture was France, where the open three-wing layout of the
palace was established as the canonical solution as early as the 16th century. But it was the Palais
du Luxembourg by Salomon de Brosse that determined the sober and classicizing direction that
French Baroque architecture was to take. For the first time, the corps de logis was emphasized as
the representative main part of the building, while the side wings were treated as hierarchically
inferior and appropriately scaled down. The medieval tower has been completely replaced by the
central projection in the shape of a monumental three-storey gateway.
De Brosse's melding of traditional French elements (e.g. lofty mansard roofs and a complex roof-
line) with extensive Italianate quotations (e.g. ubiquitous rustication, derived from Palazzo
Pitti in Florence) came to characterize the Louis XIII style. Probably the most accomplished
formulator of the new manner was François Mansart, a tireless perfectionist credited with introducing
the full Baroque to France. In his design for Château de Maisons (1642), Mansart succeeded in
reconciling academic and Baroque approaches, while demonstrating respect for the gothic-inherited
idiosyncrasies of the French tradition.

Versailles's chapel as seen from the tribune royale, an outstanding example of French Baroque

The Château of Maisons demonstrates the ongoing transition from the post-medieval chateaux of
the 16th century to the villa-like country houses of the 18th. The structure is strictly symmetrical, with
an order applied to each storey, mostly in pilaster form. The frontispiece, crowned with a separate
aggrandized roof, is infused with remarkable plasticity and the ensemble reads like a three-
dimensional whole. Mansart's structures are stripped of overblown decorative effects, so typical of
contemporary Rome. Italian Baroque influence is muted and relegated to the field of decorative
ornamentation.
The next step in the development of European residential architecture involved the integration of the
gardens in the composition of the palace, as is exemplified by Vaux-le-Vicomte), where the
architect Louis Le Vau, the designer Charles Le Brun and the gardener André Le
Nôtre complemented one another. From the main cornice to a low plinth, the miniature palace is
clothed in the so-called "colossal order", which makes the structure look more impressive. The
creative collaboration of Le Vau and Le Nôtre marked the arrival of the "Magnificent Manner" which
allowed to extend Baroque architecture outside the palace walls and transform the surrounding
landscape into an immaculate mosaic of expansive vistas.
Les Invalides in Paris by Jules Hardouin-Mansart (1676)

The same three artists scaled this concept to monumental proportions in the royal hunting lodge and
later main residence at Versailles. On a far grander scale, the palace is an exaggerated and
somewhat repetitive version of Vaux-le-Vicomte. It was both the most grandiose and the most
imitated residential building of the 17th century. Mannheim, Nordkirchen and Drottningholm were
among many foreign residences for which Versailles provided a model.
The final expansion of Versailles was superintended by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, whose key design
is the Dome des Invalides, generally regarded as the most important French church of the century.
Hardouin-Mansart profited from his uncle's instruction and plans to instill the edifice with an imperial
grandeur unprecedented in the countries north of Italy. The majestic hemispherical dome balances
the vigorous vertical thrust of the orders, which do not accurately convey the structure of the interior.
The younger architect not only revived the harmony and balance associated with the work of the
elder Mansart but also set the tone for Late Baroque French architecture, with its grand
ponderousness and increasing concessions to academicism.
The reign of Louis XV saw a reaction against the official Louis XIV Style in the shape of a more
delicate and intimate manner, known as Rococo. The style was pioneered by Nicolas Pineau, who
collaborated with Hardouin-Mansart on the interiors of the royal Château de Marly. Further
elaborated by Pierre Le Pautre and Juste-Aurèle Meissonier, the "genre pittoresque" culminated in
the interiors of the Petit Château at Chantilly(c. 1722) and Hôtel de Soubise in Paris (c. 1732), where
a fashionable emphasis on the curvilinear went beyond all reasonable measure, while sculpture,
paintings, furniture, and porcelain tended to overshadow architectural divisions of the interior.
The Low Countries[edit]
Southern Netherlands[edit]

Church of St. Michel in Leuven, Belgium by Willem Hesius (1650)

Baroque architecture in the Southern Netherlands developed rather differently from in the Protestant
North. After the Twelve Years' Truce, the Southern Netherlands remained in Catholic hands, ruled
by the Spanish Habsburg Kings. Important architectural projects were set up in the spirit of
the Counter-Reformation. In them, florid decorative detailing was more tightly knit to the structure,
thus precluding concerns of superfluity. A remarkable convergence of Spanish, French, and Dutch
Baroque aesthetics may be seen in the Abbey of Averbode (1667). Another characteristic example is
the Church of St. Michel at Louvain, with its exuberant two-storey façade, clusters of half-columns,
and the complex aggregation of French-inspired sculptural detailing.
Six decades later, a Flemish architect, Jaime Borty Milia, was the first to introduce Rococo to Spain
(Cathedral of Murcia, west façade, 1733). The greatest practitioner of the Spanish Rococo style was
a native master, Ventura Rodríguez, responsible for the dazzling interior of the Basilica of Our Lady
of the Pillar in Zaragoza (1750).
Some Flemish architects such as Wenceslas Cobergher were trained in Italy and their works were
inspired by architects such as Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola and Giacomo della Porta. Cobergher's
most major project was the Basilica of Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel which he designed as the center
of a new town in the form of a heptagon.
The influence of the painter Peter Paul Rubens on architecture was very important. With his book
"I Palazzi di Genova" he introduced novel Italian models for the conception of profane buildings and
decoration in the Southern Netherlands. The courtyard and portico of his own house in Antwerp
(Rubenshuis) are good examples of his architectural activity. He also took part in the decoration of
the Antwerp Jesuit Church (now Carolus Borromeuskerk) where he introduced a lavish Baroque
decoration, integrating sculpture and painting in the architectural program.
Northern Netherlands[edit]
Main article: Dutch Baroque architecture
Amsterdam City Hall by Jacob van Campen (1646)

There is little Baroque about Dutch architecture of the 17th century. The architecture of the first
republic in Northern Europe was meant to reflect democratic values by quoting extensively from
classical antiquity. Like contemporary developments in England, Dutch Palladianism is marked by
sobriety and restraint. Two leading architects, Jacob van Campen and Pieter Post, used such
eclectic elements as giant-order pilasters, gable roofs, central pediments, and vigorous steeples in a
coherent combination that anticipated Wren's Classicism.
The most ambitious constructions of the period included the seats of self-
government in Amsterdam (1646) and Maastricht (1658), designed by Campen and Post,
respectively. On the other hand, the residences of the House of Orange are closer to a typical
burgher mansion than to a royal palace. Two of these, Huis ten Bosch and Mauritshuis, are
symmetrical blocks with large windows, stripped of ostentatious Baroque flourishes and
mannerisms. The same austerely geometrical effect is achieved without great cost or pretentious
effects at the Stadholder's summer residence of Het Loo.
The Dutch Republic was one of the great powers of 17th-century Europe and its influence on
European architecture was by no means negligible. Dutch architects were employed on important
projects in Northern Germany, Scandinavia and Russia, disseminating their ideas in those countries.
The Dutch colonial architecture, once flourishing in the Hudson River Valley and associated primarily
with red-brick gabled houses, may still be seen in Willemstad, Curaçao.

England[edit]
Main articles: English Baroque and Edwardian Baroque architecture

Greenwich Hospital by Sir Christopher Wren (1694)

Baroque aesthetics, whose influence was so potent in mid-17th-century France, made little impact in
England during the Protectorate and the first Restoration years. For a decade between the death
of Inigo Jones in 1652 and Christopher Wren's visit to Paris in 1665 there was no English architect of
the accepted premier class. Unsurprisingly, general interest in European architectural developments
was slight.
It was Wren who presided over the genesis of the English Baroque manner, which differed from the
continental models by a clarity of design and a subtle taste for classicism. Following the Great Fire of
London, Wren rebuilt fifty-three churches, where Baroque aesthetics are apparent primarily in
dynamic structure and multiple changing views. His most ambitious work was St Paul's Cathedral,
which bears comparison with the most effulgent domed churches of Italy and France. In this
majestically proportioned edifice, the Palladian tradition of Inigo Jones is fused with contemporary
continental sensibilities in masterly equilibrium. Less influential were straightforward attempts to
engraft the Berniniesque vision onto British church architecture (e.g. by Thomas Archer in St. John's,
Smith Square, 1728).

Castle Howard, North Yorkshire

Although Wren was also active in secular architecture, the first truly Baroque country house in
England was built to a design by William Talman at Chatsworth, starting in 1687. The culmination of
Baroque architectural forms comes with Sir John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor. Each was
capable of a fully developed architectural statement, yet they preferred to work in tandem, most
notably at Castle Howard (1699) and Blenheim Palace (1705).
Although these two palaces may appear somewhat ponderous or turgid to Italian eyes, their heavy
embellishment and overpowering mass captivated the British public, albeit for a short while. Castle
Howard is a flamboyant assembly of restless masses dominated by a cylindrical domed tower which
would not be out of place in Dresden or Munich. Blenheim is a more solid construction, where the
massed stone of the arched gates and the huge solid portico becomes the main ornament.
Vanbrugh's final work was Seaton Delaval Hall (1718), a comparatively modest mansion yet unique
in the structural audacity of its style. It was at Seaton Delaval that Vanbrugh, a skillful playwright,
achieved the peak of Restoration drama, once again highlighting a parallel between Baroque
architecture and contemporary theatre. Despite his efforts, Baroque was never truly to the English
taste and well before his death in 1724, the style had lost currency in Britain.

Holy Roman Empire[edit]

Main article: Czech Baroque architecture
Schloss Charlottenburg in Berlin

In the Holy Roman Empire, the Baroque period began somewhat later. Although
the Augsburg architect Elias Holl (1573–1646) and some theoretists, including Joseph Furttenbach
the Elder already practiced the Baroque style, they remained without successors due to the ravages
of the Thirty Years' War. From about 1650 on, construction work resumed, and secular and
ecclesiastical architecture were of equal importance. During an initial phase, master-masons from
southern Switzerland and northern Italy, the so-called magistri Grigioniand the Lombard master-
masons, particularly the Carlone family from Val d'Intelvi, dominated the field. However, Austria
came soon to develop its own characteristic Baroque style during the last third of the 17th
century. Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach was impressed by Bernini. He forged a
new Imperial style by compiling architectural motifs from the entire history, most prominently seen in
his church of St. Charles Borromeo in Vienna. Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt also had an Italian
training. He developed a highly decorative style, particularly in façade architecture, which exerted
strong influences on southern Germany.

St. Charles's Church in Vienna, Austria

Frequently, the Southern German Baroque is distinguished from the Northern German Baroque,
which is more properly the distinction between the Catholic and the Protestant Baroque. In the
Catholic South, the Jesuit church of St. Michael in Munich was the first to bring Italian style across
the Alps. However, its influence on the further development of church architecture was rather limited.
A much more practical and more adaptable model of church architecture was provided by the Jesuit
church in Dillingen): the wall-pillar church, a barrel-vaulted nave accompanied by large open chapels
separated by wall-pillars. As opposed to St. Michael's in Munich, the chapels almost reach the height
of the nave in the wall-pillar church, and their vault (usually transverse barrel-vaults) springs from the
same level as the main vault of the nave. The chapels provide ample lighting; seen from the
entrance of the church, the wall-pillars form a theatrical setting for the side altars. The wall-pillar
church was further developed by the Vorarlberg school, as well as the master-masons of Bavaria.
This new church also integrated well with the hall church model of the German late Gothic age. The
wall-pillar church continued to be used throughout the 18th century (e.g. even in the early neo-
classical church of Rot an der Rot Abbey), and early wall-pillar churches could easily be refurbished
by re-decoration without any structural changes, such as the church at Dillingen.
Interior of Vierzehnheiligen church in Bavaria

However, the Catholic South also received influences from other sources, such as the so-
called radical Baroque of Bohemia. The radical Baroque of Christoph Dientzenhofer and his
son Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer, both residing at Prague, was inspired by examples from northern
Italy, particularly by the works of Guarino Guarini. It is characterized by the curvature of walls and
intersection of oval spaces. While some Bohemian influence is visible in Bavaria's most prominent
architect of the period, Johann Michael Fischer (the curved balconies of some of his earlier wall-pillar
churches), the works of Balthasar Neumann, in particular the Basilica of the Vierzehnheiligen, are
generally considered to be the final synthesis of Bohemian and German traditions.

Church of St Nicholas, Lesser Town, the most famous Baroque church in Prague

Protestant sacred architecture was of lesser importance during the Baroque, and produced only a
few works of prime importance, particularly the Frauenkirche in Dresden. Architectural theory was
more lively in the north than in the south of Germany, with Leonhard Christoph Sturm's edition
of Nikolaus Goldmann, but Sturm's theoretical considerations (e.g. on Protestant church
architecture) never really made it to practical application. In the south, theory essentially reduced to
the use of buildings and elements from illustrated books and engravings as a prototype.
Palace architecture was equally important both in the Catholic South and the Protestant North. After
an initial phase when Italian architects and influences dominated (Vienna, Rastatt), French influence
prevailed from the second decade of the 18th century onwards. The French model is characterized
by the horseshoe-like layout enclosing a cour d'honneur (courtyard) on the town side (chateau entre
cour et jardin), whereas the Italian (and also Austrian) scheme presents a block-like villa. The
principal achievements of German Palace architecture, often worked out in close collaboration of
several architects, provide a synthesis of Austro-Italian and French models. The most outstanding
palace which blends Austro-Italian and French influences into a completely new type of building is
the Würzburg Residence. While its general layout is the horseshoe-like French plan, it encloses
interior courtyards. Its façades combine Lucas von Hildebrandt's love of decoration with French-style
classical orders in two superimposed stories; its interior features the famous Austrian "imperial
staircase", but also a French-type enfilade of rooms on the garden side, inspired by the "apartement
semi-double" layout of French castles.
Wilanów Palace in Warsaw

Ostrogski Palace in Warsaw, designed by Tylman van Gameren

Ukraine (Cossack Hetmanate)[edit]

Main article: Ukrainian Baroque

St. Nicholas Cathedral in Nizhyn (1650s)

St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery

Ukrainian Baroque is an architectural style that emerged in Ukraine during the Hetmanateera, in the 17th
and 18th centuries. Ukrainian Baroque is distinct from the Western European Baroque in having more
moderate ornamentation and simpler forms, and as such was considered more constructivist. One of the
unique features of the Ukrainian baroque, were bud and pear-shaped domes, that were later borrowed by
the similar Naryshkin baroque.[23] Many Ukrainian Baroque buildings have been preserved, including
several buildings in Kiev Pechersk Lavra and the Vydubychi Monastery. The best examples of Baroque
painting are the church paintings in the Holy Trinity Church of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra. Rapid
development in engraving techniques occurred during the Ukrainian Baroque period. Advances utilized a
complex system of symbolism, allegories, heraldic signs, and sumptuous ornamentation.

Russia[edit]
Main articles: Naryshkin Baroque, Petrine Baroque, and Siberian Baroque

Peterhof Palace in Petergof

Winter Palace

Smolny Convent in Saint Petersburg

Signs Temple Of The Virgin in Moscow

In Russia, Baroque architecture passed through three stages—the early Moscow Baroque, with elegant
white decorations on red-brick walls of rather traditional churches, the mature Petrine Baroque, mostly
imported from the Low Countries, and the late Rastrelliesque Baroque, which was, in the words of William
Brumfield, "extravagant in design and execution, yet ordered by the rhythmic insistence of massed
columns and Baroque statuary."
The first baroque churches were built in the estates of the Naryshkin family of Moscow boyars. It was the
family of Natalia Naryshkina, Peter the Great's mother. Most notable in this category of small suburban
churches were the Intercession in Fili (1693–96), the Holy Tritity church in Troitse-Lykovo (1690–1695)
and the Saviour in Ubory (1694–97). They were built in red brick with profuse detailed decoration in white
stone. The belfry was not any more placed beside the church as was common in the 17th century, but on
the facade itself, usually surmounting the octagonal central church and producing daring vertical
compositions. As the style gradually spread around Russia, many monasteries were remodeled after the
latest fashion. The most delightful of these were the Novodevichy Convent and the Donskoy Monastery in
Moscow, as well as Krutitsy metochion and Solotcha Cloister near Riazan. Civic architecture also sought
to conform to the baroque aesthetics, e.g., the Sukharev Tower in Moscow and there is also a neo-form
of this style like the Principal Medicine Store on Red Square. The most important architects associated
with the Naryshkin Baroque were Yakov Bukhvostov and Peter Potapov.
Petrine Baroque is a name applied by art historians to a style of Baroque architecture and decoration
favoured by Peter the Great and employed to design buildings in the newly founded Russian
capital, Saint Petersburg, under this monarch and his immediate successors. Unlike
contemporaneous Naryshkin Baroque, favoured in Moscow, the Petrine Baroque represented a drastic
rupture with Byzantine traditions that had dominated Russian architecture for almost a millennium. Its
chief practitioners—Domenico Trezzini, Andreas Schlüter, and Mikhail Zemtsov—drew inspiration from a
rather modest Dutch, Danish, and Swedish architecture of the time. Extant examples of the style in St
Petersburg are the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the Twelve Colleges, the Kunstkamera, Kikin
Hall and Menshikov Palace.The Petrine Baroque structures outside St Petersburg are scarce; they
include the Menshikov Tower in Moscow and the Kadriorg Palace in Tallinn.

Scandinavia[edit]

French châteaux of the 17th century provided models for numerous country houses across Northern Europe

Tessin's Drottningholm Palaceillustrates the proximity between French and Swedish architectural practice.
Amalienborg Palace, a Baroque quarter in the center of Copenhagen

During the golden age of the Swedish Empire, the architecture of Nordic countries was dominated by the
Swedish court architect Nicodemus Tessin the Elder and his son Nicodemus Tessin the Younger. Their
aesthetic was readily adopted across the Baltic, in Copenhagen and Saint Petersburg.
Born in Germany, Tessin the Elder endowed Sweden with a truly national style, a well-balanced mixture
of contemporary French and medieval Hanseatic elements. His designs for the royal manor
of Drottningholm seasoned French prototypes with Italian elements, while retaining some peculiarly
Nordic features, such as the hipped roof (säteritak).
Tessin the Younger shared his father's enthusiasm for discrete palace façades. His design for
the Stockholm Palace draws so heavily on Bernini's unexecuted plans for the Louvre that one could well
imagine it standing in Naples, Vienna, or Saint Petersburg. Another example of the so-called International
Baroque, based on Roman models with little concern for national specifics, is the Royal Palace of Madrid.
The same approach is manifested is Tessin's polychrome domeless Kalmar Cathedral, a skillful pastiche
of early Italian Baroque, clothed in a giant order of paired Ionic pilasters.
It was not until the mid-18th century that Danish and Russian architecture were emancipated from
Swedish influence. A milestone of this late period is Nicolai Eigtved's design for a new district
of Copenhagen centred on the Amalienborg Palace. The palace is composed of four rectangular
mansions, originally owned by four of Denmark's greatest noble families, arranged across the angles of
an octagonal square. The restrained façades of the mansions hark back to French antecedents, while
their interiors contain some of the finest Rococo decoration in Northern Europe. Amalienborg Palace has
served as the residence of the Danish royal family since the late 18th century.Turkey[edit]
Ortaköy Mosque

The Clock Tower of Dolmabahçe Palace

The Main Entrance of Dolmabahçe Palace

Istanbul, once the capital of the Ottoman Empire, hosts many different varieties of Baroque architecture.
As reforms and innovations to modernize the country came out in 18th and 19th century, various
architecture styles were used in Turkey, one of them was the Baroque Style. As Turkish
architecture (which is also a combination of Islamic and Byzantine architecture) combined with Baroque,
a new style called Ottoman Baroque appeared. Baroque architecture is mostly seen in mosques and
palaces built in this centuries. The Ortaköy Mosque, is one of the best examples of Ottoman Baroque
Architecture. The Tanzimat Era caused more architectural development. The architectural change
continued with Sultan Mahmud II, one of the most reformist sultans in Turkish History. One of his
sons, Sultan Abdülmecid and his family left the Topkapı Palace and moved to the Dolmabahçe
Palace which is the first European-style palace in the country.
Baroque architecture in Istanbul was mostly used in palaces near the Bosphorus and Golden
Horn. Beyoğlu was one of the places that Baroque and other European style architecture buildings were
largely used. The famous streets called Istiklal Avenue, Nişantaşı, Bankalar Caddesi consist of these
architecture style apartments. The Ottoman flavour gives it its unique atmosphere, which also
distinguishes it from the later "colonial" Baroque styles, largely used in the Middle East,
especially Lebanon. Later and more mature Baroque forms in Istanbul can be found in the gates of
 the Dolmabahçe Palace which also has a very "eastern" flavour, combining Baroque, Romantic, and
Oriental architecture.

Baroque Architecture (c.1600-1750)

.

Definition: What is Baroque Architecture? - Characteristics

It was characteristic of Baroque architecture that, though examples are to

be found almost throughout Europe and Latin America, they differ notably
from one country to another. How is it, then, that they are all designated by
a single term? Partly for convenience, in order to summarize the art of a
whole period with a single word, but mainly on account of their common
aesthetic origin.

In Spain the term 'Baroque' originally denoted an irregular, oddly-shaped

St Peter's Basilica Rome.
Pope Alexander VII commissioned
Bernini in 1655, to decorate its
Cathedra Petri, piazza & approaches.
pearl, whereas in Italy it meant a pedantic, contorted argument of little
dialectic value. It ended by becoming, in almost all European languages, a
synonym for the extravagant, deformed, abnormal, unusual, absurd, and
irregular; and in this sense it was adopted by eighteenth-century critics to
apply to the art of the preceding century, which had seemed to them
conspicuously to possess such characteristics. (For a brief overview,
see: Baroque Art.)

Interior of the Basilica of the Fourteen

Holy Helpers, Bad Staffelstein, Bavaria.
Designed by Balthasar Neumann, it was
built 1743-72. An excellent example of
Late Baroque German architecture.

EVOLUTION OF VISUAL ART

For details of art movements
and styles, see: History of Art.
For a chronological guide to
key events in the development
of visual arts around the globe
see: History of Art Timeline.

In the second half of the nineteenth century the Swiss critic Heinrich Wolfflin
and his followers gave the word a more objective meaning. Still referring to
the religious art of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, they
defined as Baroque those works in which certain specific characteristics were
to be seen: the use of movement, whether actual (a curving wall, a fountain
with jets of water forever changing shape) or implied (a figure portrayed as
making a vigorous action or effort); the attempt to represent or suggest
infinity (an avenue which stretched to the horizon, a fresco giving the illusion
of a boundless sky, a trick of mirrors which altered perspectives and made
them unrecognizable); the importance given to light and its effects in the
conception of a work of art and in the final impact it created; the taste for
theatrical, grandiose, scenographic effects; and the tendency to disregard the
boundaries between the various forms of art and to mix together architecture,
painting, sculpture, and so on.

As in Renaissance architecture, the two most popular types of architectural

commissions during the Baroque era involved either churches or palaces. In
their different versions they respectively included cathedrals, parish churches,
and monastic buildings, and town and country mansions, and above all royal
palaces, these last being especially typical of the period. In addition to such
individual buildings, Baroque architecture was also characterized by what is
now known as town planning: the arrangement of cities according to
predetermined schemes, and the creation of great parks and gardens around
residences of importance.

The Baroque Idea of a Building

A building can be conceived of in many different ways: as an assemblage of

superimposed storeys (the present attitude); or more like a piece of sculpture
(the theory of Greek architecture); as a box defined by walls of regular shape
(as Renaissance architects understood it); or as a skeletal structure, that is,
one formed - according to the Gothic conception - by the various structures
needed to sustain it. Baroque architects understood it as a single mass to be
shaped according to a number of requirements. A verbal description of
Renaissance forms might be accompanied by the drawing of imaginary
straight lines in the air with an imaginary pencil; but a man describing the
Baroque is more apt to mime the shaping out of an imaginary mass of soft
plastic or clay. In short, for Baroque architects a building was to some extent
a kind of large sculpture.

Ground-Plans

This conception had a vital effect on the ground-plan - the outlines of the
building as seen from above - that came to be adopted. It led to the rejection
of the simple, elementary, analytical plans which were deliberately preferred
by Renaissance architects. Their place was taken by complex, rich, dynamic
designs, more appropriate to constructions which were no longer thought of
as 'built', or created by the union of various parts each with its own
autonomy, but rather as hollowed out, shaped from a compact mass by a
series of demarcations of contour. The ground-plans common to the
architecture of the Renaissance were the square, the circle, and the Greek
cross - a cross, that is, with equal arms. Those typical of Baroque architecture
were the ellipse or the oval, or far more complex schemes derived from
complicated geometrical figures. Francesco Castelli (1599-1667), better
known by the name he adopted for himself, Francesco Borromini, designed
a church with a ground-plan in the shape of a bee, in honour of the patron
who commissioned it, whose family coat-of-arms featured bees; and another
with walls that were throughout alternately convex and concave. One French
architect went so far as to put forward ground-plans for a series of churches
forming the letters which composed the name of his king, LOUIS LE GRAND,
as the Sun-King Louis XIV liked to be called.

Baroque Architecture's Undulating Motif

Besides their complex ground-plans, the resultant curving walls were,

therefore, the other outstanding characteristic of Baroque buildings. Not only
did they accord with the conception of a building as a single entity, but they
also introduced another constant of the Baroque, the idea of movement, into
architecture, by its very nature the most static of all the arts. And indeed,
once discovered, the undulating motif was not confined to walls. The idea of
giving movement to an architectural element in the form of more or less
regular curves and counter-curves became a dominant motif of all Baroque
art. Interiors were made to curve, from the Church of S. Andrea al
Quirinale by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, one of the main creators and exponents
of Roman Baroque, to that of S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane or S. Ivo alla
Sapienzaby Borromini, his closest rival. So too were facades, as in almost all
Borromini's work, in Bernini's plans for the Palais du Louvre in Paris, and
typically in the work of Italian, Austrian, and German architects. Even
columns were designed to undulate. Those of Bernini's great baldacchino in
the centre of St Peter's in Rome were only the first of a host of spiral columns
to be placed in Baroque churches. The Italian architect Guarino
Guarini actually evolved, and put to use in some of his buildings, an
'Undulating order', in the form of a complete system of bases, columns, and
entablatures distinguished by continuous curves.

Even excepting such extremes, during the Baroque period the taste for curves
was nonetheless marked, and found further expression in the frequent use of
devices including volutes, scrolls, and above all, 'ears' - architectural and
ornamental elements in the form of a ribbon curling round at the ends, which
were used to form a harmonious join between two points at different levels.
This device was adopted primarily as a feature of church facades, where they
were used so regularly as to be now perhaps the readiest way of identifying a
Baroque exterior. In spite of their bizarre shape their function was not purely
decorative, but principally a strengthening, functional one.

Vaults, Arches, Buttresses

The churches of the period were always built with vaulted ceilings. A vault -
first seen in Roman architecture and afterwards in Romanesque architecture -
is in effect, however, a collection of arches; and since arches tend to exert an
outward pressure on their supporting walls, in any vaulted building a
counterthrust to this pressure is needed. The element supplying this
counterthrust is the buttress, an especially typical feature in the architecture
of the Middle Ages, when the difficulty was first confronted. To introduce the
buttress into a Baroque construction it had to have a form compatible with
that of the other members, and to avoid reference to the barbaric, 'gothic'
architecture of the past. This was a problem of some importance in an age
enamoured of formal consistency - and it was solved by the use of scrolls.
The greatest English architect of the age, Sir Christopher Wren, unable for
other reasons to use the convenient scrolls for St Paul's Cathedral, yet
having somehow to provide buttresses, made the bold decision to raise the
walls of the outer aisles to the height of those of the nave so that they might
act as screens, with the sole purpose of concealing the incompatible
buttresses. False ceilings were sometimes painted onto the actual ceiling in
a trompe l'oeilmanner, using the technique of Quadratura (see below). See
also works by Wren's predecessor Inigo Jones (1573-1652).

Compare the austere whitewashed architecture of Dutch Protestant churches,

as depicted in the architectural paintings of church interiors by Pieter
Saenredam (1597-1665) and Emanuel de Witte(1615-92).

The Baroque Concept of Building Design: Architectural Sculpture

Another, and decisive, consequence of the conception of a building as a single

mass to be articulated was that a construction was no longer seen as the sum
of individual parts - facade, ground-plan, internal walls, dome, apse, and so
on - each one of which might be considered separately. As a result the
traditional rules which determined the planning of these parts became less
important or was completely disregarded. For example, for the architects of
the Renaissance the facade of a church or a palace had been a rectangle, or a
series of rectangles each of which had corresponded to a storey of the
building. For Baroque architects the facade was merely that part of the
building that faced outwards, one element of a single entity. The division into
storeys was generally retained, but almost always the central part of the
facade was organised with reference more to what was above and below it
than to what stood on either side: in other words, it was given a vertical
emphasis and thrust which was in strong contrast to the practice of horizontal
division by storeys. Furthermore, in the facade the elements - columns,
pilasters, cornices, or pediments - projecting from the wall surface, related in
various ways to the centre, which thus came to dominate the sides. Although
at first sight such a facade might seem to be divided horizontally, more
careful consideration reveals that it is organized vertically, in slices, as it
were. In the centre is the more massive, more important section, and the
sides, as the eye recedes froth it, appear less weighty. The final effect is that
of a building which has been shaped according to sculptural concepts, rather
than put together according to the traditional view of architecture.

A Baroque building is complex, surprising, dynamic: for its characteristic

features to be fully comprehended, however, or for them to stand out
prominently, it needs to catch the light in a particular way. It was this
requirement that led Baroque sculptors to achieve a number of innovations.
See, for instance, Bernini's unique use of light in The Ecstasy of Saint
Teresa(1647-52) in the Cornaro Chapel in Rome.
Architectural Manipulation of Light

It is not the light that falls on a particular point in a given building that varies,
but the effect the light produces in striking one surface by contrast with
another. It is obvious that the texture of a brick wall is not the same as that
of a similar wall of smooth marble or of rough-hewn stone. This fact was
exploited by Baroque architects for both the exteriors and the interiors of
their buildings. Renaissance constructions, like many modern ones, were
based on simple, elementary proportions and relationships; and their
significance rested in the observer's appreciation of the harmony that united
the various parts of the whole. These proportions were perceptible by looking
at the fabric alone: all that was required of the light was to make them clearly
visible. The ideal effect, sought in almost all the buildings of that period, was
that produced by a monochrome, uniform lighting. In place of the
appreciation of logic that such an effect implied, Baroque substituted the
pursuit of the unexpected, of 'effect', as it would be called in the theatre. And
as in the theatre, this is achieved more easily by deployment of light if the
light itself is concentrated in one area while others remain in darkness or in
shadow - a lesson mastered above all by Caravaggio in Baroque painting.

How can this effect be achieved in architecture? There are various

possibilities: by the juxtaposition of strong projections and overhangs with
abrupt, deep recesses; or by breaking up the surface, making it unsmooth in
some way - to return, for example, to the example used earlier, by altering a
marble-clad or plaster-covered wall to one of large, rough stones. Such
requirements of lighting dictated a use in particular for architectonic
decoration, the small-scale elements, often carved, which give a effect of
movement to the surfaces of a building. It was in the Baroque period above
all that such decoration ran riot. In buildings of the Renaissance it had been
confined to specific areas, carefully detached from the structural forms. Now,
parading the exuberance and fantasy which were its distinguishing
characteristic, it invaded every angle, swarmed over every feature, especially
corners and points where two surfaces met, where it had the function of
concealing the join so that the surfaces of the building appeared to continue
uninterrupted.

Italian Baroque Architecture

Italy, the cradle of Baroque and a key destination of those on the Grand Tour,
produced in addition to a proportionate number of good professional
architects a quartet who rate as excellent: Bernini, Borromini, Pietro da
Cortona, and Guarino Guarini. The work of each was unmistakably
Baroque, but each of them had, as it were, a different accent. Bernini and to a
lesser extent, Pietro da Cortona, represented the courtly Baroque, majestic,
and exuberant but never outrageously so, which was successful principally in
the Italian peninsula. This style possessed, at their most typical, all the
features of Baroque described above, and conveyed an air of grandeur and
dignity that rendered it a classic of its kind.

See also Quadratura - the illusionistic architectural painting technique - and

its two greatest Baroque practitioners, Pietro da Cortona (1596-1669) -
see Allegory of Divine Providence (1633-39, Palazzo Barberini) - and Andrea
Pozzo(1642-1709) - see: Apotheosis of St Ignatius (1688-94, Sant'Ignazio,
Rome). These illusionist Baroque paintings went hand in hand with the
architecture. For developments in Naples, notably trompe l'oeil architectural
frescoes, see: Neapolitan Baroque (c.1650-1700).

Bernini and St Peter's Basilica

The history of St Peter's - the most important architectural example

of Christian art - is in itself a history of the transition from Renaissance to
Baroque, and is also a textbook example of Catholic Counter-Reformation Art,
in both its structure and surroundings. Soon after the death of Michelangelo,
designer of St Peter's dome, Carlo Maderna (1556-1629) built a nave which
is not altogether a happy feature of the plan, considered as a whole, for every
attempt to expand one arm of the central space, as planned by Michelangelo,
into a nave, was bound to degrade the miraculous achievement to a mere
intersection of nave and transepts. Behind the facade, over 320 feet in width
and 150 feet in height, the dome was concealed up to half the height of the
drum. It is true that the eight columns of the entrance, the giant order of
pilasters, the massive entablature, and the attic, are as Michelangelo
intended. High Renaissance forms are combined with the exuberance of the
Baroque, in a premonition of the coming style. In 1667 Alexander VII set
Bernini the great and difficult task of giving the Church of St Peter its urban
setting. He added a tower to Maderna's facade, but it collapsed and lay about
in fragments. No one dared again to subject the foundations to the weight of
fresh building. The stumps of the towers were left, rising to the level of the
cornice of the attics, unduly widening the facade and destroying the balance
of the structure. But now, as before, the church was to be given a portico.
Bernini, in the most ingenious manner, took the opportunity of transforming
the disadvantageous widening of Maderna's facade into an improvement. To
increase the actual height of the facade was technically impossible, but
Bernini, in the true spirit of the Baroque, produced an impression of height by
ingeniously misleading the eye. The open space before the church rose in a
slight gradient, and this was crossed by pathways which approached it
obliquely, not meeting the facade at right angles, but enclosing an acute
angle. This obliquity escapes the casual glance, which unconsciously transfers
the smaller distance between the ends of the pathways to their starting-point,
so that the facade seems narrower and, owing to the upward slope, also
higher than it is in reality. In front of this forecourt, by which the eye is
doubly deceived, Bernini now levelled an open space which he enclosed with
open colonnades, thereby enhancing the effect of Michelangelo's dome,
which had been diminished by the addition of the nave. Bernini completed his
Baroque illusion by enclosing, with his arcades, an oval courtyard, which
appears larger than it is in reality. The eye, expecting to see a circle, transfers
the obvious width of the oval to the depth, which is not so great. The
colonnades, in their simplicity, play their part by directing the attention to the
facade. - But even as this facade was begun under an unlucky star, so
Bernini's plan has not been fully realized. He wanted to place a third portico,
as a terminal structure between the two semicircles. Owing to its omission -
probably on account of the death of Alexander VII - the gap which now exists
between the colonnades forms part of a typical Italian rondo, still further
enhancing the overwhelming majesty of the whole, and especially the effect
of the dome.

Borromini's designs were quite different, arguably more restless and

extravagant. They include extremely complex ground-plans and masonry, and
the deliberate contradiction of traditional detail - in the inversion of the
volutes, for instance, or in entablatures that denied their traditional function
by no longer resting on capitals but on a continuation above them.

A characteristic example of Italian Baroque design by Borromini is the little

church of S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane. Significantly, the plan of this tiny
church is built up of oval forms. The centrally planned church, either circular
or Greek cross, was used by early and High Renaissance architects to express
their ideal of perfect lucidity and order. The oval, producing a precisely
opposite effect, that of confusion and uncertainty, and above all, of
movement, was in the same way a favourite motive with Baroque architects.
The effect of the interior is one of complete plastic unity; the building might
have been carved out of one block of stone, for there is no sense of its having
been constructed out of separate elements. The same applies to the facade,
built up of an elaborate and subtle combination of convex and concave forms,
which again have no constructive purpose.

Many of Borromini's ideas were adopted by Guarini, with the addition of a

mathematical and technical factor which was of great importance in itself -
but even more because of its influence on Baroque architects outside Italy,
especially in Germany.

French Baroque Architecture

Personal variations apart, Italian Baroque could be said to correspond almost

completely to the norms described. The same cannot be said of France, which
nevertheless produced during the Baroque period a succession of excellent
architects, even more numerous than in Italy: Salomon de
Brosse, Francois Mansart (1598-1666), Louis Le Vau (1612-70), Jacques
Lemercier, and, greatest of them all, Jules Hardouin Mansart (1646-
1708). But in France personality was less significant in its effects then the
'school' to which architects could be said to belong. The attempt of the French
court to introduce Italian Baroque into France, by summoning Bernini in 1665
to Paris and commissioning him to design the reconstruction of the royal
palace - the Louvre - was doomed from the outset. As a critic rightly
observed, there was in question a radical difference of temperament. To the
French, Italian exuberance verged on the indecorous, if not wilfulness and bad
taste. Rather than as artists, French architects considered themselves
professional men, dedicated to the service and the glorification of their king.
At the court of the Roi Soleil a Baroque style was developed which was more
restrained than the Italian: ground-plans were less complex, and facades
more severe, with greater respect for the details and proportions of the
traditional architectural orders, and violent effects and flagrant caprices were
eschewed. The textbook example and greatest achievement of French
Baroque was the Palace of Versailles, the royal palace built for Louis XIV
outside Paris: a huge U-shaped mass with two long wings, disturbed hardly at
all by the small, low arcades on the main facade facing the gardens.

For interior design during the Baroque era, see: French Decorative Art. For
furnishings, see: French Furniture (1640-1792). For artists and craftsmen,
see: French Designers.

It was not in architecture, however, that the great glory of French Baroque
was to be found, but in the art of landscape gardening. Until the era of the
Baroque, gardens had been of the 'Italian' type, small parks with plants and
flower-beds laid out in geometrical schemes. Andre Le Notre, the brilliant
landscape architect who created the new, perspective, form of garden,
supplanted these by the 'French' garden, of which the park at Versailles was
to become both prototype and masterpiece. In the centre stood the palace;
on one side was the approach drive, the gates, the wide gravelled area for
carriages; and on the other were lawns and parterres, or flower-beds in
geometrical shapes, fountains, canals and broad expanses of water, and,
beyond all this, the dark line of woods pierced by long, wide, straight avenues
which were linked by circular clearings.

The imposing and austere architecture created in France, with its balance
between Baroque tendencies and classical traditions, was gradually to become
the cultural model for progressive Europe. When Sir Christopher Wren, in the
second half of the seventeenth century, decided he should bring his own ideas
up to date, it was not to Italy that he went, as had been the custom until
then, but to Paris. The Baroque architecture of Belgium and the Netherlands
likewise bears the mark of French inspiration.

German Baroque Architecture

Closer to the Italian model was German Baroque art, in Austria and Germany.
This was the case, however, only in a restricted sense. Baroque influence
came relatively late to the German states, which in the first half of the
seventeenth century had been devastated by the Thirty Years' War. Once
acclimatized, however, it underwent a remarkable growth both in quantity
and quality. The great architects of the period practised at a relatively late
time, at the end of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth
centuries; they were, however, numerous, exceptionally accomplished, and
blessed with enthusiastic patronage from the several royal, ducal, and
episcopal courts of Germany. All visited Rome, and were trained in the Italian
tradition: Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, Johann Lukas von
Hildebrandt and his more gifted pupil Johann Balthasar Neumann; to
these must be added Matthaus Poppelmann, and Francis de Cuvillies - a
Frenchman, but whose activity was almost entirely confined to Germany.

One must remember that the Baroque style in architecture - as in Baroque

sculpture - was one of propaganda: in palaces, it impressed on the onlooker
the importance of the absolute monarch; in churches, it was at the service of
'the Counter-Reformation, notably in Catholic and absolutist countries. It was
therefore in the Catholic states of South Germany, such
as Bavaria and Austria, where the most magnificent Baroque architecture is
to be found - as magnificent as anything in Italy. The greatest of the South
German Baroque architects was Balthasar Neumann (1687-1753) who
produced a miracle of palace architecture in the Wurzburg Residenz; this
went hand in hand with the building of monasteries and churches; for bishops
and abbots, no less than princes, pretended to wordly importance. Neumann
found himself confronted, in the case of the ingeniously-designed wing of the
Banz monastery at Bruhl, by the necessity of inserting a well-staircase loin in
a building erected by Schlaun in 1725-28. Here we see at its highest his
unique ability for producing an effect of unlimited space by optical illusion, the
inclusion of picturesque vistas, and by tricks of lighting. In the well-staircase
and the banqueting halls of Schloss Bruchsal he produced what is, in
consistency, design, magnificence, and lighting, one of the greatest
masterpieces of German architecture. In church architecture his most
impressive creation was the Vierzehnheiligen (the Fourteen Saints) near
Bamberg. On entering the building one is overwhelmed by a flood of light.
Everything is moving; the interior seems to be enclosed by circling,
undulating forms: even in the ground plan it appears to be completely
disintegrated. Even when no special circumstances are operative, as in the
church of the Fourteen Saints, we see that the customary ground-plan of a
Baroque church has almost completely abolished the straight line, and even
the facades are curved. Unlike the facades of Italian Baroque churches,
German churches have usually kept their towers. It was in the decoration of
these churches that this whirling combination of forms reached its height. In
the churches in which the brothers Asam co-operated, as, for example, the
monastery church at Einsiedeln, and the Carmelite church at Regensburg,
and, above all, the church of St John Nepomuk, in Munich, they reached
the limits of the possible in the combination of reality and illusion. Effects of
hidden lighting, the inclusion of fresco painting in stucco decorations, and
every other possible illusionist trick, make these churches seem now like a
pompous Baroque opera-house, now like a Rococo stage improvised for a
festival, entirely without the quiet solemnity and the piety which are bound up
with the conception of Romanesque or Gothic art.

The style of Baroque created by German architects spread to Poland,

the Baltic states, and eventually to Russia. It had considerable affinity with
Italian Baroque, with the addition of an even greater tendency to exuberant
decoration, especially of the interior; it also differed from Italian forms by its
avoidance of sharp contrasts of light and darkness in favour of a more
diffused and serene luminosity. Two features also presaged the 'Rococo' style
that was to succeed it, a style that found its widest application in these
countries and was sometimes the work of the same architects, for example
Poppelmann, Neumann, and Cuvillies. In the two main forms of construction,
churches and palaces, the Baroque of the German-speaking countries adhered
fairly consistently to a few basic designs. On churches the device of two
lateral towers with which Borromini had experimented was universally
adopted. Sometimes this was taken to the point of upsetting the general
layout, as Fischer von Erlach did in Vienna on his Karlskirche. On this, a
centrally planned building, in order to include the towers he added them as
free-standing, empty structures on either side of the main body of the church.
The whole edifice exemplifies a theatrical conception in the grand style, its
form emphasized by two columns, reminiscent of Trajan's Column in Rome,
which stand beside the towers. In palace design, meanwhile, the model was
Versailles; but Germanic architects generally showed themselves able to
surpass this example in the articulation of large masses of masonry,
accentuating the central section of the building, and sometimes the lateral
sections likewise.

Spanish & Portugese Baroque Architecture

At the same time that its influence spread north of the Alps, Italian Baroque
also asserted itself in Spain and Portugal. In these countries there was no
obstacle to its success, but here too an entirely individual style developed. Its
salient, indeed its only particular, characteristic was a profusion of decoration.
Whatever the form of a building it appeared merely to be a pretext for the
ornamentation encrusting it. Many factors contributed to this result, chief
among which were the Moorish tradition, still alive in the Iberian peninsula,
and the influences of the pre-Columbian art of America, with its fantastic
decorative vocabulary. This particular style, known as 'Churrigueresque'
from the family name, Churriguera, of a dynasty of Spanish architects who
were particularly closely associated with it, dominated Spain and Portugal for
two centuries and passed into their South American colonies, where the
decorative aspect was, if possible, intensified to a frenzy of ornamentation. Its
value is perhaps debatable, but as a style it is certainly recognizable, in its
subordination of everything to decoration.

Domestic Interior Designs

Two other characteristic themes treated by Baroque architects concerned

domestic interior structures: the complex great staircases that began to
appear in all aristocratic buildings from the seventeenth century onwards,
sometimes becoming the dominating feature; and the gallery, in origin a
wide, decorated corridor, and another showpiece, of which the Galerie des
Glacesat Versailles is an outstanding example. Often the gallery, like many
other rooms in the Baroque period, would be painted with illusionist scenes,
conveying a realistic extension in every direction of the gallery itself which
would often actually intrude upon the architecture, reducing it to a secondary
role.

The Baroque is essentially an art of illusion, in which all the tricks of scene
painting, false perspective and trompe-l'oeil, are employed without scruple to
achieve a total effect. It was also the first step back towards a conception
which the Middle Ages knew, but which the High Renaissance abandoned, that
of the subordination of painting and sculpture to the plastic unity of the
building they were to decorate, A Renaissance altarpiece or statue was
conceived as an isolated thing by itself, without very much relation to its
surroundings; Baroque painting or carving is an integral part of its setting,
and if removed from it, loses nearly all its effect.

Nineteeth Century Beaux-Arts Neo-Baroque Revival

Part of the enduring legacy of Baroque art is the Beaux-Arts style of
architecture. A combination of neo-Renaissance and neo-Baroque designs,
Beaux-Arts architecture appeared during the 19th century, and was promoted
by graduates of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, in Paris. In the United States, the
Beaux-Arts style was introduced by Richard Morris Hunt (1827-95) and Cass
 Gilbert(1859-1934). For more about the influence of 17th century designs on
modern buildings, see: Architecture 19th Century.

General Features

The fundamental characteristic of Baroque art is dynamism (a sense of motion). Strong curves, rich
decoration, and general complexity are all typical features of Baroque art (see Western Aesthetics). While
the full-blown Baroque aesthetic (full Baroque) was embraced in southern Western Europe, northern
Western Europe struck a classical-Baroque compromise (restrained Baroque).

The full Baroque aesthetic emerged during the Early Baroque (ca. 1600-25), then culminated during the
High Baroque (ca. 1625-75); both periods were led by Italy. The restrained Baroque aesthetic
culminated during the Late Baroque (ca. 1675-1725). The Baroque age concluded with the French-born
Rococo style (ca. 1725-1800), in which the violence and drama of Baroque was quieted to a gentle,
playful dynamism. The Late Baroque and Rococo periods were led by France (see Diffusion of Baroque).

phase of the Baroque age leading region

Early Baroque (ca. 1600-25)

Italy

High Baroque (ca. 1625-75)

Late Baroque (ca. 1675-1725)

France

Rococo (ca. 1725-1800)

Baroque architecture is distinguished primarily by richly sculpted surfaces. Whereas Renaissance
architects preferred planar classicism (flat surfaces veneered in classical elements), Baroque architects
freely moulded surfaces to achieve three-dimensional sculpted classicism (see example). And while the
surface of a Renaissance building is typically neatly divided into sections (in accordance with classical
clarity and order), a Baroque surface is treated as a continuous whole.6

Indeed, a Renaissance facade often consists of many similar sections, such that one's eye is not drawn
to any particular part of the building. A Baroque facade, on the other hand, often features an attention-
grabbing concentration of rich elements (e.g. curved walls, columns, blind arches, statues, relief
sculpture) around a central entrance.F303

Churches are the most splendid form of Baroque architecture in Italy, while chateaux (country mansions)
are the outstanding Baroque works of France.

England should also be noted in a discussion of Baroque architecture, for two reasons. Firstly, this period
featured Christopher Wren, often considered the greatest of all English architects. Wren designed many
of London's buildings after the Great Fire, including his masterpiece, St Paul's Cathedral. Secondly, the
Baroque age witnessed the rise of Palladian style architecture in England, which became massively
popular during the subsequent Neoclassical period.

Main Article

Early Baroque
ca. 1600-1625

The foremost pioneer of Baroque architecture was Carlo Maderno, whose masterpiece is the facade
of Saint Peter's Basilica, Vatican City.6 (Constructed under various architects throughout the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, Saint Peter's features a mixture of Renaissance and Baroque components,
the facade being one of the latter.)


 Example of Broken Pediment and Layered Pilaster (Saint Peter's Basilica)
Credit: Jean-Pol GRANDMONT

Saint Peter's Basilica

Credit: Wolfgang Stuck

Saint Peter's Basilica

Credit: Stefan Bauer

Prior to Maderno, Saint Peter's had featured a central plan design, upon which various architects had
worked (especially Michelangelo). Maderno converted the building into a Latin cross basilica by
extending the nave, thus pushing the main entrance of the church forward. Saint Peter's can therefore be
roughly divided into two parts: the core(designed largely by Michelangelo) and the
front extension (designed by Maderno). The great dome of Saint Peter's is also chiefly Michelangelo's
work, though Maderno did adjust its proportions (by stretching it vertically). G326

The facade of Saint Peter's contains a number of typical Baroque elements, including double
columns (close-set pairs of columns), layered columns, colossal columns(columns that span multiple
stories), and broken pediments (in which the bottom and/or top of a pediment features a gap, often with
ornamentation that "bursts through" the pediment). All of these elements were pioneered during the Late
Renaissance, in mannerist architecture.H758

St Peter's also makes extensive use of coffered ceilings, a common feature of monumental Western
architecture. (A "coffer" is a sunken ceiling panel, typically square, rectangular, or octagonal in shape.)

High Baroque
ca. 1625-75

The two foremost names in Baroque architecture are Bernini and Borromini, both of whom worked
primarily in Rome.

Two masterpieces of Gian Lorenzo Bernini are found at St Peter's. One is the four-story baldachin that
stands over the high altar.14 (A baldachin is an indoor canopy over a respected object, such as an altar or
throne.) The other is the curving colonnades that frame St Peter's Square.

Bernini's most famous building is likely the small church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale ("Saint Andrew's on
Quirinal Hill"). Quirinal hill is one of the "seven hills of Rome".

Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, Bernini

Credit: Council
 

Baldachin at Saint Peter's, Bernini

Credit: Ricardo André Frantz

Saint Peter's Square, Bernini

Credit: valyag et al.


Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, Bernini

Credit: Council

Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, Bernini

Credit: Council
 

Baldachin at Saint Peter's, Bernini

Credit: Ricardo André Frantz

 <
 >

Francesco Borromini was the master of curved-wall architecture. Though he designed many large
buildings, Borromini's most famous and influential work may be the small church of San Carlo alle
Quattro Fontane ("Saint Charles at the Four Fountains"). This building is also found on Quirinal Hill.

Church by Borromini
Credit: Fczarnowski
 

Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Borromini

Credit: Welleschik

Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Borromini

Credit: Chris Nas
 

Church by Borromini
Credit: Tokyorama

Church by Borromini
Credit: Fczarnowski
 

Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Borromini

Credit: Welleschik

 <
 >

Late Baroque
ca. 1675-1725

The Late Baroque marks the ascent of France as the heart of Western culture. Baroque art of France
(and northern Europe generally) tends to be restrained, such that it can be described as a classical-
Baroque compromise. The most distinctive element of French Baroque architecture is the double-
sloped mansard roof (a French innovation).


 Baroque French Building
Credit: Beckstet

Baroque French Chateau

Credit: Patrick Giraud

Baroque French Chateau

Credit: Galichonj
 

Baroque French Church

Credit: dynamosquito

Baroque French Building

Credit: Beckstet
 

Baroque French Chateau

Credit: Patrick Giraud

 <
 >

The most famous Baroque structures of France are magnificent chateaux (grand country residences),
greatest of which is the Palace of Versailles. One of the largest residences on earth, Versailles was built
mainly under Louis XIV, whose patronage of the arts helped propel France to the crest of Western
culture.1,7

The palace facade admirably illustrates the classical-Baroque compromise of northern Europe. The
walls are characterized largely by simple planar classicism, although they do contain such Baroque
elements as sculpted busts, a triple stringcourse, double pilasters, and colossal pilasters. Additionally,
the mansard roof features a sinuous metal railing and rich moulding around the dormer windows.
Versailles became Europe's model of palace architecture, inspiring similarly grand residences throughout
the continent.6
 

English Palace inspired by Versailles

Credit: Magnus Manske

Facade of Versailles
Credit: WeEnterWinter


Hall of Mirrors (Versailles)

Credit: Myrabella

Plan of Versailles
Credit: PodracerHH


German Palace inspired by Versailles

Credit: Mätes II.

Russian Palace inspired by Versailles

Credit: Cottbus
 

English Palace inspired by Versailles

Credit: Magnus Manske

Facade of Versailles
Credit: WeEnterWinter

 <
 >

Versailles' most famous room is the Hall of Mirrors, whose mirrors have the same dimensions as the
windows they stand opposite.G360-61,H872
Rococo
ca. 1725-1800

Rococo artists embraced the curves and elaborate ornament of Baroque, but reigned in its weighty
drama. The result was a gentle, playful style typified by pastel colours and delicate, asymmetrical
decoration. Though most Rococo art was centred in France (the birthplace of the style), Rococo
architecture culminated in Austria and southern Germany, especially in the form of churches.10

Rococo Building (interior)

Credit: Rufus46

Rococo Church
Credit: Dezidor
 

Rococo Church
Credit: Simon Brixel Wbrix

Rococo Church Interior

Credit: Mattana
 

Rococo Church
Credit: Aconcagua

Rococo Building
Credit: Rufus46
 

Rococo Building (interior)

Credit: Rufus46

Rococo Church
Credit: Dezidor

 <
 >
 Ages of Western Visual Art

Western visual art can be divided into eight ages. For discussion of the overall course of Western art,
see Core Regions of Western Art and Western Aesthetics.

AGES OF WESTERN ART

1000 1000-
3000-2000 BC 2000-1000 BC 0-1000
BC-0 present

1 2 3 4 7

5 6 8

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Neoclassical
Aegean Greek Roman Medieval Renaissance Baroque /Romantic Modern
ca. 3000-1200 BC ca. 1200 BC-0 ca. 0-500 ca. 500-1500 ca. 1400-1600 ca. 1600-1800 ca. 1750- ca. 1850-
1900

Baroque Architecture
Previous (Baron d'Holbach)

Next (Baroque Churches of the Philippines)

 For the Baroque style in a more general sense, see Baroque art.

Basilica di Superga near Turin: Filippo Juvarra.

The seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries marked the Baroque period in Europe and the
Americas. The period was characterized by a fluidity of design accented by a sense of drama. The
architecture of the period departed from the traditionalist forms seen in Renaissance designs and
moved toward grander structures with flowing, curving shapes. Baroque architects often incorporated
landscape design with their plans and were responsible for many of the great gardens, plazas and
courtyards of Italy.
Beginning in the early seventeenth century in Italy, Baroque architecture took the humanist Roman
vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical, theatrical, sculptural fashion,
expressing the triumph of absolutist church and state. The term 'Baroque' was actually a reference to
deformity, and Borromini's church of St. Carlo was evidence of that: unhinged and perverse. New
architectural concerns for color, light and shade, sculptural values and intensity characterize
the Baroque. 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 directly linked to the Counter-Reformation, a
movement within the Catholic Church to reform itself in response to the Protestant Reformation.
The Council of Trent (1545-1563) marked the beginning of the Counter Reformation.
The Baroque played into the demand for an architecture that was—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 new religious orders, like the Theatines
and the Jesuits, which aimed to improve popular piety. By the middle of the seventeenth century, the
Baroque style had found its secular expression in the form of grand palaces, first in France—as in the
Château de Maisons (1642) near Paris by François Mansart—and then throughout Europe.
Giacomo della Porta's façade of the Church of the Gesù, a precursor of the baroque architecture

Distinguishing Features of Baroque architecture

Important features of baroque architecture include:
 long, narrow naves are replaced by broader, occasionally circular forms
 dramatic use of light, either strong light-and-shade contrasts, chiaroscuro effects (e.g. church
of Weltenburg Abbey), or uniform lighting by means of several windows (e.g. church of
Weingarten Abbey)
 opulent use of ornaments (puttos (cherubs) made of wood (often gilded), plaster or stucco,
marble or faux finishing)
 large-scale ceiling frescoes

Santa Susanna: Carlo Maderno,.

Sicilian Baroque: San Benedetto in Catania.

 the external facade is often characterized by a dramatic central projection

 the interior is often no more than a shell for painting and sculpture (especially in the late
baroque)
 illusory effects like trompe l'oeil and the blending of painting and architecture
 in the Bavarian, Czech lands, Poland, and Ukranian baroque, pear domes are ubiquitous
 Marian and Holy Trinity columns are erected in Catholic countries, often in thanksgiving for
ending a plague

Italian Baroque
The Italian Baroque was possessed by a spirit of exuberance that stemmed from the Mannerist
conventional style. It first came to surface in the 1630s and soon encompassed all of Europe.

Carlo Maderno
The sacred architecture of the Baroque period had its beginnings in the Italian paradigm of the
basilica with the crossed dome and nave. 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. Maderno's Santa Susanna is very much like Giacomo della Porta's Il Gesú in that,
"Both are two stories high, crowned by pediments; in both the lateral extension of the lower story
forced by the side chapels is masked and joined to the central block by consoles; in both, the
movement of the orders toward the center is dramatized by an increase in projection."[1] The dynamic
rhythm of columns and pilasters, central massing, domed roofs, and the protrusion and condensed
central decoration add complexity to the structure. The differences, however, are immense. Santa
Susanna is definitive and deliberate and there is an emerging sense of unity that trademarks the style
of Italian Baroque architecture. There is an incipient playfulness with the rules of classical design,
while still maintaining the rigor of its form.

Pietro da Cortona
The same emphasis on plasticity, continuity and dramatic effects is evident in the work of Pietro da
Cortona, illustrated by San Luca e Santa Martina (1635) and Santa Maria della Pace (1656). The
latter building, with concave wings devised to simulate a theatrical set, presses forward to fill a tiny
piazza in front of it. Other Roman ensembles of the period are likewise suffused with theatricality,
dominating the surrounding cityscape as a sort of theatrical environment.

Gian Lorenzo Bernini and the Theatrical Style

"What Borromini and his contemporary and rival Gian Lorenzo Bernini did was to shape a new
theatrical style of architecture that matched the spirit of a new era in which theater, opera, and an
opulent street life had begun to emerge."[2] At that time, there was a rapid ascent of Protestantism, and
in order to re-establish Catholic dominance, the Counter-Reformation was set in motion. The best
known example of such an approach is trapezoidal Saint Peter's Square, which has been praised as a
masterstroke of Baroque theater. The square is shaped by two colonnades, designed by Gian Lorenzo
Bernini on an unprecedented colossal scale to suit the space and provide emotions of awe. Bernini's
own favorite design was the polychromatic oval church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale (1658), which,
with its lofty altar and soaring dome, provides a concentrated sampling of the new architecture. His
idea of the Baroque townhouse is typified by the Palazzo Barberini (1629) and Palazzo Chigi-
Odescalchi (1664), both in Rome. Not only in his architecture, but in his sculpture and painting,
Bernini typifies the Baroque sensuality that is pervasive throughout its age.

Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza: Francesco Borromini.

Borromini
Bernini's chief rival in the papal capital was Francesco Borromini, whose designs deviate from the
regular compositions of the ancient world and Renaissance even more dramatically. Acclaimed by
later generations as a revolutionary in architecture, Borromini condemned the anthropomorphic
approach of the 16th century, choosing to base his designs on complicated geometric figures
(modules). Borromini's architectural space seems 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 corrugated oval plan and complex convex-
concave rhythms. A later work, Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, displays the same antipathy to the flat surface
and playful inventiveness, epitomized by a corkscrew lantern dome.

Carlo Fontana
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 facade of San Marcello al
Corso. Fontana's academic approach, though lacking in the dazzling inventiveness of his Roman
predecessors, exerted substantial influence on Baroque architecture both through his prolific writings
and through a number of architects whom he trained and who would disseminate the Baroque idioms
throughout 18th-century Europe.

House of Savoy
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.

Guarino Guarini
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 stereotomy, Guarini elaborated the concept
of architectura obliqual 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 seventeenth century. Guarini's Chapel of the
Holy Shroud is a mind-boggling structural and decorative tour de force.
"The chapel, gained by two long flights of stairs, is a circle housed in a square. It contains the Holy
Shroud, the image of a man's body believed to be that of Christ as he lay in the tomb. Above it rises a
kind of stepped dome that is almost impossible to recreate piece by piece in the mind." [2]
In fact, at its height, the Baroque was a mixture of mathematical compositions and the wild and
sensual.

Filippo Juvarra
Fluid forms, weightless details and 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 roofline and masterful placement on a hill above Turin. 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 (palace) and Palacio Real de 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.
Italy and Beyond
The eighteenth 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. 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 eighteenth century. Indebted to contemporary French
and Spanish models, the palace is skillfully related to the landscape. At Naples and Caserta,
Vanvitelli practiced a sober classicizing academic style, with equal attention to aesthetics and
engineering, a style that would make an easy transition to Neoclassicism.

France: The Road to Versailles

Château de Maisons near Paris: François Mansart, 1642.

The center of baroque secular architecture was France, where the open three wing layout of the
palace was established as the canonical solution as early as the 16th century. But it was the Palais du
Luxembourg, by Salomon de Brosse that determined the sober and classicizing direction that French
Baroque architecture was to take. For the first time, the corps de logis was emphasized as the
representative main part of the building, while the side wings were treated as hierarchically inferior
and appropriately scaled down. The medieval tower has been completely replaced by the central
projection in the shape of a monumental three-storey gateway.
De Brosse's melding of traditional French elements (e.g., lofty mansard roofs and complex roofline)
with extensive Italianate quotations (e.g., ubiquitous rustication, derived from Palazzo Pitti in
Florence) came to characterize the Louis XIII style.

François Mansart
 Château de Maisons
Arguably the most accomplished formulator of the new manner was François Mansart, a tireless
perfectionist credited with introducing the full Baroque to France. In his design for Château de
Maisons (1642), Mansart succeeded in reconciling academic and baroque approaches, while
demonstrating respect for the gothic-inherited idiosyncracies of the French tradition.

Vaux-le-Vicomte near Paris: Louis Le Vau and André Le Nôtre, 1661.

The Château of Maisons demonstrates the ongoing transition from the post-medieval chateaux of the
sixteenth century to the villa-like country houses of the eighteenth. The structure is strictly
symmetrical, with an order applied to each story, mostly in pilaster form. The frontispiece, crowned
with a separate aggrandized roof, is infused with remarkable plasticity and the whole ensemble reads
like a three-dimensional whole. Mansart's structures are stripped of overblown decorative effects, so
typical of contemporary Rome. Italian Baroque influence is muted and relegated to the field of
decorative ornamentation.
 Vaux-le-Vicomte
The next step in the development of European residential architecture involved the integration of the
gardens in the composition of the palace, as is exemplified by Vaux-le-Vicomte, where the architect
Louis Le Vau, the designer Charles Le Brun and the gardener André Le Nôtre complemented each
other.[1] From the main cornice to a low plinth, the miniature palace is clothed in the so-called
"colossal order," which makes the structure look more impressive. The creative collaboration of Le
Vau and Le Nôtre marked the arrival of the "Magnificent Manner" which allowed to extend Baroque
architecture outside the palace walls and transform the surrounding landscape into an immaculate
mosaic of expansive vistas.
Les Invalides, Paris: Jules Hardouin-Mansart, 1676.

There is a majestic grandeur that leads to a harmony or unification and elegance that identifies the
Baroque style.
 Versailles
The same three artists scaled this concept to monumental proportions in the royal hunting lodge and
later main residence at Versailles). On a far grander scale, the palace is a hypertrophied and
somewhat repetitive version of Vaux-le-Vicomte. It was both the most grandiose and the most
imitated residential building of the 17th century. Mannheim, Nordkirchen and Drottningholm Palace
were among many foreign residences for which Versailles provided a model.
The final expansion of Versailles was superintended by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, whose key design is
the Dome des Invalides, generally regarded as the most important French church of the century.
Hardouin-Mansart profited from his uncle's instruction and plans to instill the edifice with an
imperial grandeur unprecedented in the countries north of Italy. The majestic hemispherical dome
balances the vigorous vertical thrust of the orders, which do not accurately convey the structure of
the interior. The younger architect not only revived the harmony and balance associated with the
work of the elder Mansart but also set the tone for Late Baroque French architecture, with its grand
ponderousness and increasing concessions to academicism.

Rococo
The reign of Louis XV saw a reaction against the official Louis XIV style in the shape of a more
delicate and intimate manner, known as Rococo. The style was pioneered by Nicolas Pineau, who
collaborated with Hardouin-Mansart on the interiors of the royal Château de Marly. Further
elaborated by Pierre Le Pautre and Juste-Aurèle Meissonier, the "genre pittoresque" culminated in
the interiors of the Château de Chantilly (c. 1722) and Hôtel de Soubise in Paris (c. 1732), where a
fashionable emphasis on the curvilinear went beyond all reasonable measure, while sculpture,
paintings, furniture, and porcelain tended to overshadow architectural divisions of the interior.
Malta
Valletta, the capital city of Malta, was laid out in 1566 to fortify the Knights of Rhodes, who had
taken over the island when they were driven from Rhodes by Islamic armies. The city, designed by
Francesco Laparelli on a grid plan, and built up over the next century, remains a particularly coherent
example of Baroque urbanism. Its massive fortifications, which were considered state of the art, until
the modern age, are also largely intact. Valletta became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980.

Netherlands

Amsterdam City Hall: Jacob van Campen, 1646.

There is little Baroque about Dutch architecture of the seventeenth century. The architecture of the
first republic in Northern Europe was meant to reflect democratic values by quoting extensively from
classical antiquity. Like contemporary developments in England, Dutch Palladianism is marked by
sobriety and restraint. Two leading architects, Jacob van Campen and Pieter Post, used such eclectic
elements as giant-order pilasters, gable roofs, central pediments, and vigorous steeples in a coherent
combination that anticipated Christopher Wren's Classicism.
The most ambitious constructions of the period included the town hall in Amsterdam (1646) and
Maastricht (1658), designed by Campen and Post, respectively. On the other hand, the residences of
the House of Orange are closer to a typical burgher mansion than to a royal palace. Two of
these, Huis ten Bosch and Mauritshuis, are symmetrical blocks with large windows, stripped of
ostentatious Baroque flourishes and mannerisms. The same austerely geometrical effect is achieved
without great cost or pretentious effects at the stadholder's summer residence of Het Loo.

Belgium
Baroque Architecture in the Southern Netherlands developed rather differently than in the Protestant
North. Important architectural projects were set up in the spirit of the Counter Reformation. Flemish
architects such as Wenzel Coebergher were trained in Italy and their works were inspired by the
works of architects such as Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola and Giacomo della Porta. Coebergher's most
important project was the Basilica of Our Fair Lady of Scherpenheuvel, which he designed as the
center of a new town in the form of a heptagon. The influence of Peter Paul Rubens on architecture
was very important. With his book I Palazzi di Genova he introduced novel Italian models for the
conception of profane buildings and decoration in the Southern Netherlands. The Courtyard and
Portico of his own house in Antwerp (Rubenshuis) are good examples of his architectural activity.
He also took part in the decoration of the Antwerp Jesuit Church (now Carolus-Borromeuskerk) were
he introduced a lavish baroque decoration, integrating sculpture and painting in the architectural
program.

England

Greenwich Hospital: Sir Christopher Wren, 1694.

Baroque aesthetics, whose influence was so potent in mid-17th century France, made little impact
in England during the Protectorate and the first English Restoration. For a decade between the death
of Inigo Jones in 1652 and Christopher Wren's visit to Paris in 1665 there was no English architect of
the accepted premier class. Unsurprisingly, general interest in European architectural developments
was slight.
It was Wren who presided over the genesis of the English Baroque manner, which differed from the
continental models by clarity of design and subtle taste for classicism. Following the Great Fire of
London, Wren rebuilt 53 churches, where Baroque aesthetics are apparent primarily in dynamic
structure and multiple changing views. His most ambitious work was St Paul's Cathedral, which
bears comparison with the most effulgent domed churches of Italy and France. In this majestically
proportioned edifice, the Palladian tradition of Inigo Jones is fused with contemporary continental
sensibilities in masterly equilibrium. Less influential were straightforward attempts to engraft the
Berniniesque vision onto British church architecture (e.g., by Thomas Archer in St. John's, Smith
Square, 1728).
Seaton Delaval Hall: Sir John Vanbrugh, 1718.

Although Wren was also active in secular architecture, the first truly baroque country house
in England was built to a design by William Talman (architect) at Chatsworth House, starting in
1687. The culmination of Baroque architectural forms comes with Sir John Vanbrugh and Nicholas
Hawksmoor. Each was capable of a fully developed architectural statement, yet they preferred to
work in tandem, most notably at Castle Howard (1699) and Blenheim Palace (1705).
Although these two palaces may appear somewhat ponderous or turgid to Italian eyes, their heavy
embellishment and overpowering mass captivated the British public, albeit for a short while. Castle
Howard is a flamboyant assembly of restless masses dominated by a cylindrical domed tower which
would not be out of place in Dresden or Munich. Blenheim is a more solid construction, where the
massed stone of the arched gates and the huge solid portico becomes the main ornament. Vanbrugh's
final work was Seaton Delaval Hall (1718), a comparatively modest mansion yet unique in the
structural audacity of its style. It was at Seaton Delaval that Vanbrugh, a skillful playwright,
achieved the peak of Restoration drama, once again highlighting a parallel between Baroque
architecture and contemporary theatre. Despite his efforts, Baroque was never truly to the English
taste and well before his death in 1724 the style had lost currency in Britain.

Scandinavia

French châteaux of the 17th century provided models for numerous country houses across Northern Europe.
Tessin's Drottningholm Palace illustrates the proximity between French and Swedish architectural practice.

During the golden age of the Swedish Empire, the architecture of Nordic countries was dominated by
the Swedish court architect Nicodemus Tessin the Elder and his son Nicodemus Tessin the Younger.
Their aesthetic was readily adopted across the Baltic, in Copenhagen and Saint Petersburg.
Born in Germany, Tessin the Elder endowed Sweden with a truly national style, a well-balanced
mixture of contemporary French and medieval Hanseatic elements. His designs for the royal manor
of Drottningholm Palace seasoned French prototypes with Italian elements, while retaining some
peculiarly Nordic features, such as the hipped roof (säteritak).

Amalienborg, a Baroque quarter in the center of Copenhagen.

Tessin the Younger shared his father's enthusiasm for discrete palace facades. His design for the
Stockholm Palace draws so heavily on Bernini's unexecuted plans for the Louvre that we could well
imagine it standing in Naples, Vienna, or Saint Petersburg. Another example of the so-called
International Baroque, based on Roman models with little concern for national specifics, is the Royal
Palace of Madrid. The same approach is manifested is Tessin's polychrome domeless, a skillful
pastiche of early Italian Baroque, clothed in a giant order of paired Ionic pilasters.
It was not until the mid-18th century that Danish and Russian architecture emancipated from
Swedish influence. A milestone of this late period is Nicolai Eigtved's design for a new district
of Copenhagen centered on the Amalienborg Palace. The palace is composed of four rectangular
mansions for the four greatest nobles of the kingdom, arranged across the angles of an octagonal
square. The restrained facades of the mansions hark back to French antecedents, while their interiors
contain some of the finest Rococo decoration in Northern Europe.

Holy Roman Empire

In the Holy Roman Empire, the baroque period began somewhat later. Although the Augsburg
architect Elias Holl (1573-1646) and some theoreticians, including Joseph Furttenbach the Elder
already practiced the baroque style, they remained without successors due to the ravages of the
Thirty Years' War. From about 1650 on, construction work resumed, and secular and ecclesiastical
architecture were of equal importance. During an initial phase, master-masons from southern
Switzerland and northern Italy, the so-called magistri Grigioniand the Lombard master-masons,
particularly the Carlone family from Val d'Intelvi, dominated the field. However, Austria came soon
to develop its own characteristic baroque style during the last third of the seventeenth century.
Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach was impressed by Bernini. He forged a new Imperial style by
compiling architectural motifs from the entire history, most prominently seen in his church of St.
Charles Borromeo in Vienna. Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt also had Italian training. He developed
a highly decorative style, particularly in facade architecture, which exerted strong influences on
southern Germany.
Frequently, the Southern German baroque is distinguished from the Northern German baroque,
which is more properly the distinction between the Catholic and the Protestant baroque.

Augustusburg, a typical baroque palace from Westphalia.

In the Catholic South, the Jesuit church of St. Michael's Church in Munich was the first to bring
Italian style across the Alps. However, its influence on the further development of church
architecture was rather limited. A much more practical and more adaptable model of church
architecture was provided by the Jesuit church in Dillingen: the wall-pillar church, that is, a barrel-
vaulted nave accompanied by large open chapels separated by wall-pillars. As opposed to St.
Michael's in Munich, the chapels almost reach the height of the nave in the wall-pillar church, and
their vault (usually transverse barrel-vaults) springs from the same level as the main vault of the
nave. The chapels provide ample lighting; seen from the entrance of the church, the wall-pillars form
a theatrical setting for the side altars. The wall-pillar church was further developed by the Vorarlberg
school, as well as the master-masons of Bavaria. The wall-pillar church also integrated well with the
hall church model of the German late Gothic age. The wall-pillar church continued to be used
throughout the eighteenth century (e.g., even in the early neo-classical church of Rot a der Rot), and
early wall-pillar churches could easily be refurbished by re-decoration without any structural
changes, for example, the church at Dillingen.

The Church of St. Nicolas in Prague. Radical Bohemian Baroque

However, the Catholic South also received influences from other sources, e.g., the so-called radical
baroque of Bohemia. The radical baroque of Christoph Dientzenhofer and his son Kilian Ignaz
Dientzenhofer, both residing at Prague, was inspired by examples from northern Italy, particularly by
the works of Guarino Guarini. It is characterized by the curvature of walls and intersection of oval
spaces. While some Bohemian influence is visible in Bavaria's most prominent architect of the
period, Johann Michael Fischer, e.g., in the curved balconies of some of his earlier wall-pillar
churches, the works of Balthasar Neumann are generally considered to be the final synthesis of
Bohemian and German traditions.
Protestant sacred architecture was of lesser importance during the baroque, and produced only a few
works of prime importance, particularly the Frauenkirche in Dresden. Architectural theory was more
lively in the north than in the south of Germany, e.g., Leonhard Christoph Sturm's edition of
Nikolaus Goldmann, but Sturm's theoretical considerations (e.g., on Protestant church architecture)
never really made it to practical application. In the south, theory essentially reduced to the use of
buildings and elements from illustrated books and engravings as a prototype.
Palace architecture was equally important both in the Catholic South and the Protestant North. After
an initial phase when Italian architects and influences dominated (Vienna, Rastatt), French influence
prevailed from the second decennium of the eighteenth century onwards. The French model is
characterized by the horseshoe-like layout enclosing a cour d'honneur (courtyard) on the town
side (chateau entre cour et jardin), whereas the Italian (and also Austrian) scheme presents a block-
like villa. The principal achievements of German Palace architecture, often worked out in close
collaboration of several architects, provide a synthesis of Austro-Italian and French models. The
most outstanding palace which blends Austro-Italian and French influences into a completely new
type of building is the residence at Würzburg. While its general layout is the horseshoe-like French
plan, it encloses interior courtyards. Its facades combine Lucas von Hildebrandt's love of decoration
with French-style classical orders in two superimposed stories; its interior features the famous
Austrian "imperial staircase," but also a French-type enfilade of rooms on the garden side, inspired
by the "apartement semi-double" layout of French castles.

Hungary and Romania

In the Kingdom of Hungary the first great Baroque building was the Jesuit Church of Nagyszombat
built by Pietro Spozzo in 1629-1637, modeling the Church of the Gesu in Rome. Jesuits were the
main propagators of the new style with their churches in Győr (1634-1641), Kassa (1671-1684), Eger
(1731-1733) and Székesfehérvár (1745-1751). The reconstruction of the territories devastated by
the Ottomans was carried out in Baroque style in eighteenth century. Intact Baroque townscapes can
be found in Győr, Székesfehérvár, Eger, Veszprém, Esztergom and the Castle District of Buda. The
most important Baroque palaces in Hungary were the Royal Palace in Buda, Grassalkovich Castle in
Gödöllő and Esterházy Castle in Fertőd. Smaller Baroque castles of the Hungarian aristocracy are
scattered all over the country. Hungarian Baroque shows the double influence of Austrian and Italian
artistic tendencies as many German and Italian architects worked in the country. The main
characteristics of the local version of the style were modesty, lack of excessive decoration and some
"rural" flavor, especially in the works of the local masters. Important architects of the Hungarian
Baroque were András Mayerhoffer, Ignác Oraschek and Márton Wittwer. Franz Anton Pilgram also
worked in the Kingdom of Hungary, for example, on the great Premonstratensian monastery of Jászó.
In the last decades of the eighteenth century Neo-Classical tendencies became dominant. The two
most important architects of that period were Menyhért Hefele and Jakab Fellner.
Two most important architectural representations of Baroque in Romania, are the Brukenthal Palace
in Sibiu city, and the former Bishopric Palace in Oradea, now a state museum.

Russia

View of the Winter Palace from the Palace Square

In Russia, the baroque architecture passed through three stages–the early Moscow baroque, with
elegant white decorations on red-brick walls of rather traditional churches, the
mature Petrine baroque, mostly imported from Low Countries, and the late Rastrelliesque baroque, in
the words of William Brumfield, "extravagant in design and execution, yet ordered by the rhythmic
insistence of massed columns and baroque statuary."

Portugal and Brazil

Nothwithstanding a prodigality of sensually rich surface decoration associated with Baroque
architecture of the Iberian Peninsula, the royal courts of Madrid and Lisbon generally favored a more
sober architectural vocabulary distilled from seventeenth-century Italy. The Royal Palace of Madrid,
La Granja, Palacio Real de Aranjuez, Convent of Mafra and Palace of Queluz were designed by
architects under strong influence of Bernini and Juvarra. In the realm of church architecture,
Guarini's design for Sta. Maria della Divina Providenza in Lisbon was a pace-setter for structural
audacity in the region (even though it was never built). The first fully baroque church in Portugal was
the Church of Santa Engrácia), in Lisbon, designed by royal architect João Antunes.

Palácio do Raio in Braga,.

By the mid-eighteenth century, northern Portuguese architects had absorbed the concepts of Italian
Baroque to revel in the plasticity of local granite in such projects as the surging 75-meter-high Torre
dos Clérigos in Porto). The foremost center of the national Baroque tradition was Braga, whose
buildings encompass virtually every important feature of Portuguese architecture and design. The
Baroque shrines and palaces of Braga are noted for polychrome ornamental patterns, undulating
rooflines, and irregularly shaped window surrounds.
São Francisco de Assis in São João del Rei: Aleijadinho, 1777.

Brazilian architects also explored plasticity in form and decoration, though they rarely surpassed
their continental peers in ostentation. The churches of Mariana, Minas Gerais and the Rosario at
Ouro Preto are based on Borromini's vision of interlocking elliptical spaces. At São Pedro dos
Clérigos, Recife, a conventional stucco-and-stone facade is enlivened by "a high scrolled gable
squeezed tightly between the towers"[3].
Even after the Baroque conventions passed out of fashion in Europe, the style was long practiced in
Brazil by Aleijadinho, a brilliant and prolific architect in whose designs hints of Rococo could be
discerned. His church of Bom Jesus de Matozinhos at Congonhas is distinguished by a picturesque
silhouette and dark ornamental detail on a light stuccoed facade. Although Aleijadinho was originally
commissioned to design São Francisco de Assis, São João del Rei his designs were rejected, and
were displaced to the church of São Francisco in Ouro Preto instead.

Convent of Mafra, Portugal: Ludovice,.

Spain and Belgium

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 sixteenth century. As early as 1667, the facades of Granada Cathedral (by Alonso Cano) and
Jaén, Spain (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 facade 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, 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 the
Toledo Cathedral.
The development of the style passed through three phases. Between 1680 and 1720, the Churriguera
popularized Guarino Guarini's blend of Solomonic 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.
Church of St. Michel in Louvain, Belgium: Willem Hesius, 1650.

Two of the most eye-catching creations of Spanish Baroque are the energetic facades 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 Gaudi 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.
In the wealthy Southern Netherlandish domain of the Spanish kings, Flanders, florid decorative
detailing was more tightly knit to the structure, thus precluding concerns of superfluity. A remarkable
convergence of Spanish, French and Dutch Baroque aesthetics may be seen in the Abbey of
Averbode (1667). Another characteristic example is the Church of St. Michel at Louvain), with its
exuberant two-story facade, clusters of half-columns, and the complex aggregation of French-
inspired sculptural detailing.
Six decades later, a Flemish architect, Jaime Borty Milia, was the first to introduce Rococo to Spain
(Cathedral of Murcia, west facade, 1733). The greatest practitioner of the Spanish Rococo style was a
native master, Ventura Rodríguez, responsible for the dazzling interior of the Basilica of Our Lady of
the Pillar in Saragossa (1750).
Spanish America

San Francisco de Asís Church, Lima, 1673.

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 and Asian colonies of Spain. Even more than its Spanish
counterpart, American Baroque developed as a style of stucco decoration. Twin-towered facades of
many American cathedrals of the seventeenth 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.
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 eighteenth century, architects of the region turned for inspiration
to the Mudejar art of medieval Spain. The late Baroque type of Peruvian facade first appears in the
Church of Our Lady of La Merced, Lima). Similarly, the Church of La Compañia, Quito) suggests a
carved altarpiece with its richly sculpted facade and a surfeit of spiral salomónica.
The facade of the church of Ss. Sebastian y Santa Prisca in Taxco) bristles with Mexican Churrigueresque

ornamentation.

To the north, the richest province of eighteenth-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 Ocotlan (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[4]
The true capital of Mexican Baroque is Puebla, where a ready supply of hand-painted ceramics 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 60 churches whose facades 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 eighteenth century, local artisans developed a distinctive
brand of white stucco decoration, named "alfenique" after a Pueblan candy made from egg whites
and sugar.

Themes of Baroque Architecture

The Baroque period was one of the most exciting times for European architecture. During this period,
from the end of the 16th century to the dawn of the 18th century, European architecture exploded in novel
directions. Rather than designing a single building, an architect might be responsible for reimagining a
complex of buildings, or even planning an entire city. With this shift, the capitol of art and architecture
moved from Rome to Paris.
Regular, repeating designs gave way to curves and irregularity, as various styles were mixed and
adapted. Yet this variety was regulated for the purposes of symmetry and grandeur. Finally, for the
first time since antiquity, architects began tinkering with optical illusion in building. They realized you
could trick the eye into making a large building seem even grander. This hearkens back to Greek tricks
that allowed their grand temples to tower even larger in the eye of the beholder.
Though Baroque architecture found its way across Europe, two countries came to the fore in this field:
Italy and France. Baroque architecture got its start in Italy and is still evident today at the Vatican in
Rome. This new architectural form reached its apex in France. Its mark can be seen quite clearly in Paris,
but its purest expression can be found in that most Baroque of all buildings, Louis XIV's palace at
Versailles.

Welcome to the fourth article of our series: Architecture – A Stroll Through the Epochs. We
continue our series with Baroque architecture as our next subject — undeniably the grandest and
most sumptuous of the classical styles.
To establish the cause of Europe’s turn toward artistic exuberance in the face of the established
Renaissance style, we have to remind ourselves of certain religious and geo-political events that
sent Central Europe into more than a century of turmoil and devastation.

Throughout the 15th century, the Roman Catholic Church saw herself, and her status as the sole
keeper of the keys to salvation, weakened by disputes driven by more secular motives. Key
challenges came from the Western Schism, which displayed its corrupted curia, and new
Renaissance ideas that led people to question some of the core values that determined their daily
lives.

With faith in the papacy shaken, a growing theological disagreement gained momentum, which
ultimately led to the schism within Western Christianity. Known as the Protestant Reformation,
this movement is forever linked to the date 31 October 1517. On this day, Martin Luther posted
his ninety-five theses on the main portal of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg.

His most crucial reproaches were the selling of indulgences, as Luther denied the pope’s alleged
authority over purgatory and argued that the gospel did not provide theological grounds for the
Catholic doctrine of the merits of the saints.

The Roman Catholic Church, very much aware that her influence and powers were now severely
threatened, responded with a Counter-Reformation initiated by the Council of Trent (1545 –
1563). At Trent, the Church formally recognized that inner reform was undeniably necessary, but
on the other hand determined that the battling of Protestantism and its leaders — Martin Luther,
John Calvin and Huldrych Zwingli — was most important.

LTR Portraits of Martin Luther, Johannes Calvin, Huldrych Zwingli and Pope Paul III

For this very purpose, a new order called the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) was instituted by Pope
Paul III in 1540. Their charter included the vow of obedience: “That we may be altogether of the
same mind and in conformity… if [the Holy See of the Universal Church (Roman Catholic
Church)] shall have defined anything to be black which to our eyes appears to be white, we
ought in like manner to pronounce it to be black.” The Jesuits set the tone for the ferocity with
which this fight for the right beliefs was going to be fought.

Ultimately, Northern Europe, with the exception of most of Ireland, came under the influence of
Protestantism, while Southern Europe remained Roman Catholic. Central Europe, the dominion
of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, was the site of fierce conflict, culminating in
the Eighty Years’ War (1568–1648) and the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648), which left it
massively devastated after hostilities finally ended with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.

All these confrontations and struggles resulted in a diverse social, religious and political
landscape in 17th and 18th century Europe. Alongside one another existed absolutist
principalities and monarchies — like the Kingdom of France under the rule of the House of
Bourbon — the Dutch Republic, and constitutional monarchies like the Kingdom of England (the
Kingdom of Great Britain after 1 May 1707); all of which flourished and developed their very
own interpretations of a new style we now know as Baroque architecture.
Not unlike the names of previous architectural epochs, the designation “Baroque” came from
critics of the new style. They likened its excess of detail and deliberate deviation from the clear
and rational formality of the Renaissance to the irregular shape of imperfect natural pearls.
“Baroque” is the French transliteration of the Portuguese phrase “pérola barroca,” which means
“irregular pearl.”

There was no denying its opulence, nor the artists’ craftsmanship, but critics bemoaned the loss
of the natural grace of Renaissance architecture.

1. Roman Baroque
As the Catholic Church found itself in need of a way to proactively manifest its influence and
regain lost souls all over Europe, it turned renewed attention to church architecture, requiring
new churches to appeal as much to the emotions as to the intellect of the faithful, ultimately
persuading them into unconditional trust and faith in the Catholic Church. To achieve this goal,
the very act of approaching and stepping into a church had to become more of an experience; one
that would envelope the faithful in Catholic symbolism and mystery.

What resulted from these requirements was an architectural vocabulary that allowed for very
dynamic designs, often employing a mixture of repetition, breaking-up, and distortion of
Renaissance classical motifs. Due to an almost playful way of handling these abstracted or
exaggerated elements — like broken pediments, giant orders, and convex and concave walls —
baroque architects were able to express their very personal ideas and styles to a degree unheard
of before.
 TLTR Façade and interior of the Church of the Gesù; Façade and interior of the Church of Saint Charles at the four Fountains
BLTR St. Peter’s Basilica with Maderno’s Baroque façade; Bernini’s Baroque facade, Palazzo Barberini – all Rome, Italy

The first structure to follow this new design philosophy and to break with the Renaissance
traditions of following strict formulas, in both the design of the exterior as well as the interior,
was the Church of the Gesù in Rome. Not at all coincidentally, it was to be the mother church of
the newly founded Jesuit order.

Designed by Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola (1507-1573) and constructed between 1568 and 1584,
it first and foremost simplified the floor plan of the Renaissance church. Vignola removed the
narthex and reduced the church body to a single nave without aisles (though lined with chapels
on either side) all to focus the attention of the congregation on the high altar and eventually the
nave’s illusion-inducing ceiling fresco, the grandiose Triumph of the Name of Jesusby Giovanni
Battista Gaulli (1639-1709).

Due to the death of Vignola in 1573, the executed design of the façade is not his own, but that of
his pupil Giacomo della Porta (1533-1602). It is dominated by an ever increasing plasticity
towards its center, giant volutes framing the upper level, the use of broken pediments, as well as
the idiosyncratic combination of an arched pediment surrounding a triangular pediment, resulting
in a very vivid spectacle of design and decoration.

As a result of Il Gesù being the mother church of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), its design was
soon spread all over the world as the Jesuits acted as the religious (re-)conquistadors all over
Europe and the Americas. Curiously enough though, della Porta would never again design
exteriors as flamboyant as that of Il Gesù, his later designs being rather mature and subtle; but
the precedent for the new style had now been firmly set.

With the onset of the 17th century, Rome’s transformation into a truly Catholic city was well
underway, and architecture, painting and sculpture would play an important role in this
monumental undertaking. Several of the major projects that were started in the early 16th century
would actually be finished or remodeled in the new baroque style. Most notable among them was
St. Peter’s Basilica, which was built over the course of 120 years and documented the change
from High Renaissance to Mannerism and finally Baroque, both in elements of its interior and
exterior design.

Whereas Carlo Maderno (1556-1629) was limited by the already set dimensions, proportions and
prevailing stylistic parameters for his design of the façade of St. Peter’s Basilica, Francesco
Borromini, on his first independent commission, was free to fully express the idea of an illusion-
inducing façade with his design for the Church of Saint Charles at the Four Fountains (San Carlo
alle Quattro Fontane).

Regarded as one of the iconic masterpieces of Baroque architecture, this tiny church, with a
footprint of barely 2500 sq. ft., is defined by its almost surreal undulating façade of concave and
convex shapes and an interior equally extraordinary and complex.

Naturally, the baroque style was not reserved for ecclesiastical structures. Many Roman families
had their own private properties remodeled, or commissioned entirely new villas or palaces.
Among the most renowned artists employed were Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) and
Francesco Borromini (1599-1667), who excelled in unifying the previous Renaissance style with
new baroque elements using open loggias, grand staircases and a general emphasize on
entrances.

The most famous Baroque home in Rome was the Palazzo Barberini, which was begun by Carlo
Maderno while he was working on the nave of St. Peter’s Basilica. After his passing, it was
finished by Bernini and Borromini in a brief joint effort.

By the mid 17th century, the Baroque style had reached a maturity known as “High Baroque”
and its influence spread north of Rome. One of its chief propagators being Guarino Guarini
(1624-1683), who settled in Turin and is regarded as one of the masters of this style. Especially
his executed designs in Paris, Praque and Lisbon, along with his published works on architectural
theory and design, helped spread Italian baroque ideals across Europe in the early 18th century.
 T: Palazzo Carignano, Turin BLTR Etching showing the design of the façade for Sainte Anne-la-Royale, Paris, France (never-
completed); Etching showing the interior design for St. Mary Our Lady of Divine Providence, Lisbon, Portugal (destroyed during
the earthquake of 1755); Etching showing the design of the façade for St. Mary of Altötting, Praque, Czech-Republic

Befitting its status as the birthplace of the Baroque, Italy also set the stage for “the swan song of
the spectacular art of the Baroque,” namely the Palace of Caserta in southern Italy; built between
1752 and the first half of the 19th century. Formerly a royal residence built for the House of
Bourbon-Two Sicilies, the Palace of Caserta was one of the largest royal residences in the world.
 Main façade of the Royal Palace of Caserta, Caserta, Italy

2. French Baroque
2. French Baroque
In 1605, work on the first of the five Parisian “Place Royale” began and concluded in 1612.
Known today as the Place des Vosges, it heralded the idea of the uniform residential square
dominated by house fronts all built to the same design. In total, the square is lined with 36 three-
storied townhouses resting on a circumferential arcade, all executed in the Brique-et-Pierre style,
which is characterized by the combination of brickwork, quoins of ashlar and slate covered roofs.
The only slight deviation from this pattern was found in the Pavillon du Roi and the Pavillon de
la Reine at the center of the southern, respectively northern side of the square, as they rest on
grander arcades to provide easier access to the square.

TLTR: View of the Place des Vosges and the Pavillion de la Reine; View of the two buildings flanking the entrance to the Place
Dauphine; View of the Place de la Concorde with the Obelisk of Luxor BLTR: View of the Place des Victoires and the statue of Louis
XIV; View of the Place Vendôme with the Vendôme Column at the center – all Paris, France
As Henri IV, first of the Bourbon monarchs, had passed away in 1610, his son Louis XIII
became King of France and would lay the groundwork for the single most important French
Baroque building project, the Palace of Versailles. Coincidentally, it was a naturalized
Florentine, Albert de Gondi, who familiarized Louis XIII with the countryside around Versailles,
where he hosted a number of hunting trips for the king. Louis XIII was so taken by the location
that he ordered the construction of a “hunting lodge” in 1624. The small château was designed
by Philibert Le Roy and executed in the popular Brique-et-Pierre style. About eight years after its
completion, Louis XIII bought the estate of Versailles from the Gondi family to be able to
enlarge the site.
 LTR Portraits of Henri IV, Loius XIII, Louis XIV and Louis XV

When Louis XIII eventually died in 1643, Versailles was inherited by his son and successor
Louis XIV — at this time still a mere residence among others. Therefore, it was only used as a
summer residence by Louis XIV at the beginning of his reign, but this was about to change as
another grand building project was to become the symbol of a new style known today as the
Architecture Classique (classical Baroque).

In 1656, Nicolas Fouquet, minister of finance to Louis XIV, commissioned architect Louis Le
Vau (1612-1670) and landscape architect André Le Nôtre (1613-1700) to construct a vast estate
near Melun in the Île-de-France. Following the example of the Luxembourg Palace (1615-1645)
in Paris, Le Vau established a sober, uniform style with Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte, which was
characterized by symmetry, repetition and the impression of solidity and strength. His use of
typical baroque motifs was limited, but due to their repetition, remained visually prominent.
 Southern façade of Château de Vaux le Vicomte, Melun, France

Consequently, in 1664, Louis XIV commissioned Le Vau to rebuild the Château de Versailles to
fit the needs of his court, and so that he would have a residence that would overshadow all the
other palaces in France with its magnificence.

Split into four major building campaigns during the reign of Louis XIV, the first starting in 1664
and the last one ending in 1710, the development of the palace and gardens at Versailles
constituted the greatest building activity in France at the time.

As part of the preparations for a major festivity, known as the Plaisirs de l’Île enchantée, the
first building campaign (1664–1668) resulted in a number of alterations in the château and
gardens to provide further accommodations for guests of the court.
The second campaign, which followed closely after the first (1669-1672), brought about a major
change in the appearance of the palace. Due to the insistence of Louis XIV to keep the “hunting
lodge” as the heart of the growing palace, Le Vau had to come up with a solution that would
result in a functional and harmonious ensemble. He achieved this by enclosing the “hunting
lodge” on the north, west and south with a so called enveloppe, which is often referred to as as
the château neuf (New Palace). It provided new lodgings for the king and members of his family,
though the northern and southern wings were not yet connected via the Hall of Mirrors; instead a
great terrace allowed for an elevated view of the gardens.

Due to his death in 1670, Louis Le Vau wasn’t able to oversee the completion of the second
building campaign and Louis XIV had to find a new court architect. Eventually, Jules Hardouin-
Mansart (1646-1708) was appointed to the post in 1675, himself one of the most renowned
French Baroque architects, along with his great uncle, François Mansart. The mansard roof, so
characteristic of Baroque architecture, was named for them, although neither invented this type
of roof. That achievement belongs to Pierre Lescot, best known for his work on the Louvre
Palace in the mid-16th century.

With a new court architect in charge, the third building campaign began in 1678. This campaign
was the most comprehensive and would give the palace much of its final appearance. In addition
to the aforementioned Hall of Mirrors, Hardouin-Mansart added the north and south wings that
would provide accommodations for the nobility and Princes of Blood, as well as the orangerie.
Work was completed in 1684.

After a 15 year hiatus, Hardouin-Mansart returned to Versailles and commenced work on the
construction of the royal chapel as the major part of the fourth and final building campaign under
the patronage of Louis XIV. After Hardouin-Mansart passed away, the work was completed by
Robert de Cotte (1656-1735). With the completion of the chapel and all the remodeling work on
the interior in 1710, building activities at Versailles ceased for 21 years.
 Versailles as hunting lodge in 1652 and after the campaigns of 1664 – 1669 – 1678 – 1699

Due to the involvement of the greatest architects and artists of the time, Versailles did not only
influence the course of French architecture, but most European architecture well into the 18th
century.

The most immediate result of the style and splendor established by the Palace of Versailles was
the development of the hôtel particulier, a private urban villa that mimicked the layout of the
palace on a miniature scale. A U-shaped ensemble that allowed for entre cour et jardin to either
arrive via the cour d’honneur, which would face a road, or through the garden at the back of the
corpse de logis.
One of the most admired hôtel particulier at the time of its completion in 1772 was the Hôtel
d’Évreux, which would become infamous as the Paris home of the mistress Marquise de
Pompadour, given to her as a gift by Louis XV. This set the tone for its varied history to this very
day, now better known as the Élysée Palace, the official residence of the President of the French
Republic.

Cour d’honneur of the Élysée Palace, Paris, France

3. Early English Baroque

The beginning of the English Barqoue period was heralded by a major catastrophe: the Great
Fire of London in 1666. It raged for four days (2-5 September 1666) in the medieval City of
London inside the old Roman city wall, and destroyed 13,200 houses, 87 parish churches, St.
Paul’s Cathedral and most of the buildings of the City authorities.

But like any great catastrophe, the fire provided the opportunity to start with a clean slate and
begin a remodeling after the great baroque examples seen in France and Italy. Some of the best
architects, cartographers and landscapers submitted plans, which would have transformed
London into a truly contemporary city structured by squares, radiating avenues and striking
vistas. Unfortunately, this ambitious plan never came to fruition due to insurmountable
bureaucratic hurdles, and so the city was rebuild on its only slightly altered old medieval street
plan.
 LTR Plans for rebuilding the City of London by Sir Christopher Wren and John Evelyn

As part of a series of acts that were passed for rebuilding the City of London, particular reference
was given to the rebuilding of its churches and cathedrals. Responsible for their design was the
office of Sir Christopher Wren (1632-1723), the Surveyor-General, and his chief assistant Robert
Hooke (1635-1703). Among them they shared a personal history of scientific training, but
neither of them was a trained architect as it was common to be an autodidact in this field in
England at the time.

LTR Portraits of Sir Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke

Nonetheless, due to extensive travels through France, Wren acquired the knowledge and
understanding necessary to employ the techniques and stylistic ideals of the French classical
Baroque for his own designs to overcome the difficulties of erecting Baroque churches within the
constraints of a medieval city. Often these solutions would involve distortions and adaptations; a
clever play with perspective.

LTR St. Edmund, King and Martyr, City of London; St. Martin, Ludgate; St. Margaret, Lothbury – all London

His greatest challenge came with the rebuilding of St.Paul’s Cathedral. As a beckon of the
Anglican Church, it had to adhere to English liturgical tradition and provide the faithful with a
recognizable house of God. These requirements resulted in a number of rejected designs, as
Wren struggled to consolidate contemporary design and Anglican traditions. When he finally
was given the royal warrant by King Charles II for his fourth design proposal in 1675, work
finally began; though it has to be noted that Wren had little intention to actually build the
approved design.

LTR: Wren’s initial Greek Cross design for St. Paul’s Cathedral, which was inspired by the Dome of Les Invalides in Paris; The
Great Model of 1673 showing the evolution of the greek cross floor plan of Wren’s first design with the addition of a nave on the
western side; The Warrant Design as approved by Charles II
Even before the warrant was signed, he already made several alterations to the design, exploiting
the King’s concession that gave him “the Liberty, in the Prosecution of his Work, to make some
Variations, rather ornamental, than essential, as from Time to Time he should see proper…”

His freedom to turn St. Paul’s into what he envisioned it to be, with his “Great Model” of 1673,
grew immensely with the accession of James II in 1685, who, as one of his first official acts,
raised the percentage of coal tax revenue allocated to St Paul’s by more than three times the
existing amount.
 Western and south-eastern views of St. Pauls Cathedral, London, England

Therefore, St. Paul’s may rest on a Gothic longitudinal Latin Cross plan, with a nave and aisles
structure very similar to Old St. Paul’s Cathedral, but the church is dressed up in a grand English
Baroque shell and adorned with a double-shelled dome mimicking that of St. Peter’s Cathedral in
Rome. Indeed, it holds a rightful place among the greatest ecclesiastical structures of the
Baroque epoch.

4. Later English Baroque

After Wren’s death in 1723, a new generation of architects emerged, some of whom even came
from amid the ranks of his former employees.

Nicholas Hawksmoor (1661-1736) had been employed by Christopher Wren from the age of 18
and assisted him until 1718. Chelsea Hospital, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Hampton Court Palace and
Greenwich Hospital were among the most renowned works erected during this time.
TTB Royal Hospital Chelsea, Chelsea, London, England; View from the Privy Garden towards the southern front of Hampton
Court, Greater London, England; View of Greenwich Hospital with Inigo Jones’s Queen’s House in the center background,
Greenwich, London, England
Later in his life, Hawksmoor collaborated with John Vanbrugh (1664-1726) on a number of
important projects including Castle Howard and Blenheim Palace. Vanbrugh was a rather
infamous character; a dramatist who had been incarcerated on a charge of espionage in the
Bastille and a member of the Kit-Cat Club, he turned architect at the age of 35.

LTR Easton Neston House, Towcester, England; Clarendon Building, Oxford, England; St. Alfege Greenwich, London, England;
St. Mary, Woolnoth, London

Both Hawksmoor’s and Vanbrugh’s works are characterized by a progressive rejection of

Wren’s subtle Baroque in the style of the French classicism, in favor of a bolder and more
masculine style derived from the Palladianism of Inigo Jones. The whole idea of mass and scale
was made the most prominent feature in their works; with ornamentation of the exterior being
reduced to a minimum. This lead to an austere, yet unapologetically bold design vocabulary.

LTR Castle Howard, York, England; Blenheim Palace, Woodstock, England; Seaton Delaval Hall, Seaton Delaval, England

5. Northern and Central European

Baroque
The spread of the Baroque across northern and central Europe began in the second half of the
17th century and was defined by the prevailing state religion and political system. Accordingly,
there was either an influence of Roman baroque or French classicism to be found at the heart of
most any building project.
 TLTR: Drottningholm Palace, Drottningholm, Sweden; Upper Belvedere Palace, Vienna, Austria; Zwinger Palace, Dresden,
Germany BLTR: Winter Palace, St. Pertersburg, Russia; New Palace, Potsdam, Germany

European Catholic cities, in particular, were keen on emulating the sculptural plasticity of the
Roman baroque in their ecclesiastical commissions, while most royal palaces and residences
were clearly influenced by the exmaple set by Versailles.
TLTR: Interior of Asam Church, Munich, Germany; Melk Abbey, Melk, Austria BLTR: Murcia Cathedral, Murcia, Spain; Interior
of St. Peter and St. Paul’s Church, Vilnius, Lithuania
6. Rococo
Even though Versailles was considered a beacon of style and copied countless times, it was
flawed in one particular regard. Its scale and purpose as a public government apparatus meant
that it was not a pleasent home to live in.

This fact was most apparent to the architects who were commissioned to develop the numerous
town houses and hôtels of the Parisian nobility. Therefore, men like Just-Auèle Meissonnier,
Gilles-Marie Openordt, Nicolas Pineau, and Germain Boffrand developed interior designs that
embraced the more intimate scale and lay the emphasis on a comfortable arrangement of rooms.
They focused the decoration on light, frivolous, and colorful schemes, often allowing panels,
doorframes, walls and the ceiling of a room to merge and dissolved into one richly ornamented
encapsulating sphere.

The term rococo once again originated in nature, with the French term rocaille being a
portmanteau of the words “roc” (rock) and “coquille” (shell).
CCW: Terraces and southern façade of Sanssouci Palace, Potsdam, Germany; Giant rocaille ceiling ornamanet, Sanssouci Palace,
Potsdam, Germany; Rococo exterior of Benrath Palace, Düsseldorf, Germany; Hall of Mirrors in the Amalienburg Pavillion at
Nymphenburg Palace, Munich, Germany
Summary

Article Name

Baroque Architecture - A Stroll through the Epochs – 16th - 18th Century

Description

Learn all about Baroque architecture in this beginner's guide that is easy to understand and packed with useful information.

10 Masterpieces of Baroque
Architecture
Baroque architecture flourished between the late 16th and mid-18th century.
The architectural style which emerged in Italy soon spread to the rest of
Europe and by the 17th century, Spanish Baroque style (also referred to as
Churrigueresque) reached Latin America. Initially used to express the
triumph of the Roman Catholic Church over Protestant Reformation, the
architectural style later also came to be used as a visual demonstration of
absolutist regime in the form of magnificent palaces. Listed below are 10
masterpieces of Baroque architecture, both religious and secular.
San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Rome

Designed by one of the leading Baroque architects Francesco Borromini (1599-

1667), the San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane (also known as the Church of Saint
Charles at the Four Fountains) is one of the finest examples of Baroque
architecture. The Roman Catholic church was built between 1638 and 1646
when it was consecrated, while the facade was completed in the 1670s by
Borromini’s nephew Bernardo.

St. Peter's Square, Vatican

The St. Peter’s Square and its imposing colonnades with 140 statues of saints
are the work of Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) who was next to Francesco
Borromini one of the most prominent architects of the Baroque era. He also
built the left fountain largely following the design of the earlier Carlo
Maderno’s fountain (on the right) to create a symmetry. In the center of the
square stands an ancient Egyptian obelisk which was erected on its current
site in 1586 by Domenico Fontana.

Les Invalides, Paris

Les Invalides is one of the greatest masterpieces of French Baroque

architecture. Most of the complex was built by French architect Liberal Bruant
(1635-1697), while the spectacular chapel dome was completed by Jules
Hardouin Mansart (1644-1708). Built as a retirement home and hospital for
veterans between 1671 and 1678, Les Invalides is today home to the museum
of the French Army, museum of military models and museum of
contemporary history. But it is also the final resting place of several French
national heroes including Napoleon Bonaparte.
Palace of Versailles, Versailles

The Palace of Versailles, one of the grandest palaces ever built is the finest
example of secular Baroque architecture. Commissioned by Louis XIV (1643-
1715) in the 1660s, most of the palace including its spectacular Hall of Mirrors
was designed by architect Jules Hardouin Mansart. The Sun King’s successors
made some alterations but the magnificent palace and its gardens are just as
impressive as they were in the time of Louis XIV. Since 1837, the Palace of
Versailles is open to the public as a museum.

Karlskirche, Vienna

The beautiful Baroque church is one of Vienna’s most admired buildings. It

was commissioned by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI (1685-1740) who
vowed to build a church after the last major plague outbreak in the early 18th
century. Karlskirche was built between 1716 and 1737 after the design of
Austrian architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach (1656-1723) who won
the competition for design of the church. He died before completion of his
masterpiece which was completed by his son Joseph Emanuel.

Schönbrunn Palace, Vienna

The Schönbrunn Palace is a former summer residence of the Habsburg

monarchs that was built in late Baroque style. Just like Karlskirche, the
Austrian version of the Palace of Versailles is the work of architect Johann
Bernhard Fischer von Erlach although it later went through some changes.
After the collapse of Austria-Hungary and the downfall of the Habsburgs in
1918, the palace became owned by the Republic of Austria and was eventually
opened to the public as a museum.
St Paul's Cathedral, London

Built on a site of an earlier church that was severely damaged in the Great Fire
of London in 1666, the St Paul’s Cathedral is widely considered as one of the
finest examples of English Baroque architecture. The design is the work of the
celebrated English architect Sir Christopher Wren (1632-1723) who was also
commissioned to rebuilt over 50 churches that were damaged in the Great Fire
and many notable secular buildings across England. From 1710 when
completed until 1962, St Paul’s was the tallest building in London.

Winter Palace, Saint Petersburg

The Winter Palace was built as the residence of Peter the Great (1672-1725) in
Saint Petersburg and served as the official residence of the Romanov
monarchs from 1732 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. Peter’s palace
which was designed by Swiss Italian architect Domenico Trezzini in the so-
called Petrine Baroque style, however, was altered considerably by his
successors. Most of its present-day appearance dates from the late 1830s when
it was rebuilt due to damage caused by a fire. The Winter Palace was also
severely damaged during the Siege of Leningrad (1941-44) but was later
restored in its former grandeur.

Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, Western Facade

One of Spain’s most famous cathedrals and a pilgrimage site since the Middle
Ages, the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela is a Romanesque building. But
the later added western facade of Obradoiro is widely considered as one of
the most beautiful examples of Spanish Baroque style or Churrigueresque
(named after Spanish architect Jose Benito de Churriguera). The facade was
built in the 18th century by architect Fernando de Casas Novoa.
Zacatecas Cathedral, Zacatecas

The Zacatecas Cathedral in the city of Zacatecas, Mexico, is regarded as one of

the finest examples of Mexican Baroque architecture. The cathedral basilica
was built between 1730 and 1760 by an unknown architect on a site of an
earlier 16th century church. In addition to reflecting the influence of the
Spanish Churrigueresque, the cathedral also reflects incorporation of
indigenous decorative elements. In 1993, it was inscribed in the list of
UNESCO World Heritage Sites as a part of the Historic Center of Zacatecas.

Artsz.org
Art Explained and Made Simple