#Baccio Pontelli Architect

[claudiaeisuoisogni]

Chiesa di Sant'Aurea.

Borgo di Ostia Antica, Roma

Forse in una vita precedente vivevo qui.

[furlantravelfashionblogger]

#SistineUnseen!⠀

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🗝Every day hundreds of people visit the Sistine Chapel. Some visitors are religious, others are not. The Sistine Chapel is a fatal attraction, the object of desire for the⠀

international Museum population, for migrants of so-called cultural tourism.⠀

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🙏However, the Sistine Chapel, although part of the museum path, is not⠀

a museum. It is a religious space, a consecrated chapel. Here the great liturgies are celebrated; here cardinals gather in conclave to elect the pontiff. The Sistine Chapel is at the same time the synthesis of Catholic theology, the ark of the new and definitive covenant that God established with the⠀

Christian people.⠀

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📐Because of this, architect Baccio Pontelli, who between 1477 and 1481⠀

modified and raised previous structures, wanted to give the Sistine⠀

Chapel the dimensions of the lost Temple of Jerusalem, as mentioned in the Bible.⠀

⠀

#museivaticani #vaticanmuseums #ig_italia #italia

@clavigero_dei_musei_vaticani

[missziane]

Sistine Chapel, ceiling and interior

~ Artwork by Michelangelo, located in Vatican City

construction began in 1473 and later was opened on the 5th of August, 1483

located in the Vatican City

*the structure itself was designed by the architects Baccio Pontelli and Giovannino de Dolci

[levifdoote]

Avenue south residence4

Throughout history there has been a tradition of people coming together to build society. Whether forced labor or a labor of love, the world's most ambitious projects have been built through collaboration. When you think of architectural collaboration; images of Egyptian Pyramids, Roman Coliseums, and Indian Temples come to mind. These are civilization's designs of grandeur.

What collaborations in architecture continue to bring community together? Let's take a look at four architectural marvels throughout the world.

The Sistine Chapel: The Sistine Chapel in Vatican City, Rome. Ground breaking for this Chapel took place in 1473. The church was completed in 1481; eight years later. It was designed by Baccio Pontelli and constructed by Giovanni de Dolci under orders of Sixtus IV.

The Chapel is based on the temple of Solomon and the dimensions recorded in the Old Testament of the Bible. Although exact measurements cannot be made, surveys estimate it to be 40.9 meters (134 ft) long by 13.4 meters (44 ft) wide. The exterior of the building is plain. This was a common practice in Italy when the Chapel was built. The Chapel is three levels; a basement also with vaulted ceilings to support the Chapel, the Chapel, and a third story to house soldiers.

The exterior may be plain, but the interior of the Chapel is spectacular. It boasts of richly colored marble floors, barrel vaulted ceilings, and six arched windows on each side wall. This is just where the story begins. Pope Sixtus the IV commissioned several artists to decorate the Chapel. The collaboration produced 12 large frescoes telling the stories of the Bible. The Chapel's North side paintings tell about the life of Moses. On the South side they tell the life of Jesus. The artists who collaborated were; Domenico Ghirlandaio, Sandro Botticelli, Perugino, Cosimo Rosselli, Pinturicchio, Benedetto Ghirlandaio, Luca Signorelli and Bartolomeo della Gatta.

Then in 1505 Pope Julius II asked Michelangelo to paint the ceiling. Although Michelangelo didn't want to paint the ceiling, he agreed to the request. He began the paintings in 1508 and finished in 1511. The paintings told of the major stories of the Old Testament. In 1537 Pope Paul III ordered Michelangelo to paint another fresco above the alter. Michelangelo chose the subject of The Last Judgement. It was finished in 1541.

Due to the collaboration and incredible decoration of the Sistine Chapel it quickly brought many visitors. Giorgio Vasari, a famous historian of the times said hundreds of people came every day to stare and stare. Today 5 million tourists visit the Sistine Chapel every year, with peaks of around 20,000 visitors per day.

The Taj Mahal: One of the greatest works of collaboration in India is on a mausoleum built between the years of 1631 and 1648. The rest of the buildings, including a mosque, finished 5 years later. It is called Taj Mahal and is labeled one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. It holds status of a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1983. National Geographic reports that 3 million tourists visit the mausoleum every year. It is located in Agra, a major city in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

This monument was built as a tribute to the third wife of Mughal emperor Shah Jahan. His third wife, Mumtaz died in childbirth in 1631. Legend says she bound him to an oath to make her the most beautiful mausoleum ever built. He accomplished this amazing feat by employing thousands of artists and craftsman. They came from India, Persia, Turkey, Syria and other parts of the world. It is estimated that the labor numbered twenty thousand workers. The head architect is thought to be Ustad Ahmad Lahauri But the most known feature, the dome, was designed by Ismail Afandi; a Turkish architect. Other architects who worked on this project included Abd ul-Karim Ma'mur Khan and Makramat Khan.

The dome is the central focus of the entire complex. It is constructed of white marble and is a height of 35 meters (115 ft), the same as the length of the base. The top of the dome is decorated with a lotus design. There are four minarets, very tall towers. Each tower is more than 40 meters (130 ft) tall. The entire complex is symmetric. The only asymmetric point in the complex is where the tombs of Mumtaz and Shah Jahan are placed.

Unlike the Sistine Chapel, the outside of the tomb is exquisitely decorated. These decorations included carvings, stone inlays, painting, and stucco. Inside the mausoleum is inlaid with precious and semi-precious jewels. The interior walls are 25 meters high and are topped by an interior dome. This dome is decorated with sun motif. 8 arches within the domed define the space and each chamber wall is intricately designed. Decorations include refined calligraphy panel, intricate lapidary and dado bas-relief, and. These panels mimic the design elements which are seen right throughout the building's exterior.

The materials used to build the Taj Mahal were brought from Asia and India. It is said to have taken 1,000 elephants to carry the vast supplies. Wikipedia states that; "The translucent white marble was brought from Makrana, Rajasthan, the jasper from Punjab, jade and crystal Avenue south residence  from China. The turquoise was from Tibet and the Lapis lazuli from Afghanistan, while the sapphire came from Sri Lanka and the carnelian from Arabia. In all, twenty-eight types of precious and semi-precious stones were inlaid into the white marble."

The Taj Mahal has suffered damage over the years but great attempts have been made to protect this ambitious creation. British viceroy Lord Curzon ordered a sweeping restoration project, which completed in 1908. Several times in history brick scaffolding was erected to mislead bomber pilots. The structural integrity has been of concern in the recent years. Regardless of this, Taj Mahal is one of the many wonders of this world. It is no wonder millions of people visit each year.

[divusborgia]

Palazzo Della Rovere is a palace in Rome, Italy, facing Via della Conciliazione. It is also known as Palazzo dei Penitenzieri. The construction of the palace was started in 1480 by cardinal Domenico della Rovere, a relative of Pope Sixtus IV della Rovere, perhaps under the design of the Florentine architect Baccio Pontelli. The palazzo was built between 1480 and 1490 on the south side of Piazza Scossacavalli, destroyed in 1937 together with the spina di Borgo; Pontelli modelled it closely on the architectural style of Palazzo Venezia, the most important building in 15th century Rome. Five halls of the piano nobile, are now the official reception rooms of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.  The current name was added during the reign of pope Alexander VII, who moved here the Papal confessors known as penitenzieri. The building has a massive façade, inspired by that of Palazzo Venezia, with a tower on the northeast corner. The name of Domenico della Rovere is written on the windows of the first floor, while the coat of arms on the façade is that of Pope Clement XIV. The interior has a court on two levels: a lower one with a portico featuring octagonal pillars and a pit, and an upper one with gardens. The palace has a rich internal decoration, often depicting fake architectures. The most notable is that of the Semi-Gods Ceiling, a gallery of mythological and allegorical figures painted by Pinturicchio in 1501. 

Caesar returning from Spoleto, settled in this palace. Giovanni Andrea Boccaccio draws a picture of him worthy of attention, “On the day before yesterday I found Cesare at home in Trastevere. He was on the point of setting out to go hunting, and entirely in secular habit; that is to say, dressed in silk and armed. Riding together, we talked a while. I am among his most intimate acquaintances. He is man of great talent and of an excellent nature; his manners are those of the son of a great prince; above everything, he is joyous and light-hearted. He is very modest, much superior to, and of a much finer appearance than, his brother the Duke of Gandia, who also is not short of natural gifts. The archbishop never had any inclination for the priesthood. But his benefice yields him over 16,000 ducats.”. This is the first true profile of Caesar Borgia. He was only a young man. We do not know if the architectures of his ambitious purposes were already in his mind. He probably thought about politics but also about having fun. In 1496, someone reported to the Gonzaga of Mantua that Caesar was not interested in political affairs. The assertion was certainly exaggerated. All his life, all his actions make us believe that since then he was already very interested in politics. He kept himself apart, surrended only by his favorite Spaniards. Caesar was a horse lover, very skilled in handling weapons and above all he was a passionate hunter, and so will be later. He sought falcons, hounds and greyhounds. He sought them in Germany, he writes to the Archbishop of Mainz so that he sends to him dogs and the most beautiful horses of all Italy. Alexander VI was amused by that and usually laughed to hear his son talk about the “valentia” of his dogs. He paid attention to physical and athletic exercises. Did Caesar had a love affair? A historian of Italian-Spanish literature speaking of certain Spanish verses of the Cancionero General said that Caesar wore on the cloak his initials intermingled with the ones of his unknown lover. These verses could have been written during a mysterious Caesar’s stay in Spain, we don’t know. Maybe they are just inspired verses. No record, no document of those days speaks around the life of the young prelate. How much we know of his life in the following years gives us reason to believe it was premature even in the sexual field. He was young, beautiful, strong, elegant, rich and was his father’s son, hot and ruthless. Neither habit nor bishop’s duties were an obstacle for him. For his father, as for his mother Vannozza, Caesar always showed a strong attachment and affectionate affiliation. When he left Pisa to go to Rome we can see that Caesar was always alongside his father in civil and religious functions. On Sunday, May 5, he was also with the cardinals and his brother, Duke of Gandia, in the parade behind the pope, who went to the Vatican to celebrate in Santa Maria del Popolo. He took part at the wedding ceremony of his sister Lucrezia and when a few days later Don Diego Lopez de Haro came to Rome to obey the new Pontiff in the name of the king and queen of Spain, Alexander sent his two sons to meet him, Caesar and Juan. Caesar rode in the middle having the brother to his right and the brother-in-law to his left side. This could prove against the assertion of almost all the biographers of the Borgias that Caesar occupied in the family a higher place than the brother Duke of Gandia. Occasionally, Caesar moved away from Rome to make some excursions or some hunting. He went to Caprola on the slope of Cimino perhaps with his friend Alessandro Farnese whose family then built a magnificent villa in that place.

Source: Cesare Borgia. La sua vita, la sua famiglia, i suoi tempi by Gustavo Sacerdote

[renatofilomena]

Leitura

Such anomalies, difficult to reconcile with the rational, humanistic mentality characteristic of the late 1400s, were analysed in the context of an intervention aimed at the global revival of a  pre-existent structure which to be overlayed by the new chapel. The construction materials of the older building were, in fact, incorporated up to the level of the window-sills, from which point the masonry of the Sistine Chapel itself commences. The cerimonial importance of the liturgical functions that took place in the chapel called for an ambient capable of expressing the concept of papal majesty, not least on occasions linked to the diplomatic and political activities of the Holy See that were enacted here. The Pope had a private chapel destined for daily use - Sixtus IV made use of the Niccolina - nevertheless, the liturgical calendar envisaged functions and events that, at times, would be celebrated in the Basilica of St. Peter’s, but more frequently in the large pontifical chapel situated in the place. From its very beginnings, the vast space was divided by a monumental screen or transenna, intended to separate the true papal chapel from the area reserved for guests and political personages, who could thus assist at the cerimonies without, however, mingling with the pontifical court itself. It is the Florentine architect Baccio Pontelli (1450-1492) that the noted 16th Century biographer Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) credits with the design of the Sistine Chapel; initiated in 1477 and completed in the summer of 1481, under the direction of the architect Giovannino de’ Dolci. Several documents testify to the latter having been paid for work on the chapel.