attempts to break free of Gothic traditions

Bartolomeo Buon, Antonio Gambello, Mauro

Codussi distanced themselves from Gothic forms in
their works

Gothic - Renaissance - Baroque

Tuscan - modern?

S.Michele di Isola

San Zaccaria portal of SS. Giovanni e Paolo

The church facades of the first half of the fifteenth century are
divided into three sections by piers or pilasters corresponding to the
nave and aisles

? three sections - starting from 15th century

? alternation
For the facade of
S.Maria della Carita
Bartolomeo Buon
designed three very
steep, triangular,
ornamented
pediments with crab-
like crocketing above
round arches with
framing friezes and
the usual tabernacles
surmounting the piers.
Two splendid tall
windows illuminate
the aisles, as was
common in Venice;
an oculus lights the
S.Maria della Carita
nave.
In S.Maria dei Frari, S.Stefano, the Madonna dell'Orto, roof
diagonals abut on the very high middle section of the facade, which
is crowned by a pediment resembling a triangle without a base.

S Maria Gloriosa dei Frari

Madonna dell'Orto
Santo Stefano
Another group features quarter-circular tympana over the aisles
and a semicircular tympanum crowning the nave(S. Andrea della
Zirada). Sometimes the center of the facade is crowned by reverse-
curve moldings(S. Giovanni in Bragora). S. Giobbe, before the
baroque alterations, probably belonged to this group as well.

San Giovanni in Bragora Sant'Andrea della Zirada

S.Giobbe
In tripartite facade of hall churches, diagonals joining to form a
pediment are dominant(S.Elena), while in fivebay facade a central
section might be emphasized by diagonals(S.Alvise). Some of these
Gothic brick facades showed their masonry, usually enhanced by
painted joints in place of real mortar courses, while others were
stuccoed. Thus a document of 1461 deals with the whitening of the
facade of S.Gregorio. However, no uniform practice seems to have
existed.

S.Gregorio

S.Alvise S.Elena
The flat rustication of an Istrian stone that seamlessly incorporates
the pilasters was to be found previously in Bartolomeo Buon's Ca
del Duca.

Ca del Duca S.Michele di Isola

The quadrants and pediments were familiar to Venetians
from Gothic facades like S.Giovanni in Bragora, but the
compartmentalizing of the facade by entablatures and pilasters was
new, although the short upper pilaster strips turn out on closer
inspection to be piers. Porphyry roundels decorate the marble
panels around the oculus, elongated shell molding the quadrants,
and radial fluting the semicircular pediment. The origins of the
facade of S.Giovanni in Bragora and others related to it have not
been securely dated as yet. What is certain is that this facade type
was chosen by the Venetian sculptors and architects Pierpaolo
and Jacobello dalle Masegne for Mantua Catheral as early as 14th
century.

Mantua Cathedral San Giovanni in Bragora

Mauro Codussi later used this system of facade again, in 1497, for
the cruciform domed church of S.Giovanni Crisostomo, though
divested of all space-filling motifs. Other architects followed him for
a long time afterwards. S.Felice, begun 1531, is only one example.

S.Felice
The basilica of S.Michele, probably built on ealier foundations, In the last third of the century the dome canopy was made the
recalls Gothic building in the proportions of its nave. climax of several sacred buildings. The choir chaple of S.Giobbe(ca.
1471) and S.Maria dei Miracoli(1485), as well as less impossing
chapels, should be mentioned here.

The choir chaple of S.Giobbe

S.Maria dei Miracoli
 different architects - subcontracts
personal contacts - influential aristocrats
S. Zaccaria - Antonio Gambello - Mauro Codussi

low ground storey

interior storey - facade
4 piers - to the top
horizontal motifs