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RENAISSANCE HARMONY
BRILLIANT CULTURE OF RENAISSANCE
KULESHOV VASILIY
MIIGAIK 2014
INTRODUCTION
 The brilliant Renaissance culture of Italy was influential throughout
Europe, though at first often confined to ornamental details and
spreading only slowly in view of the vitality of the Late Gothic tradition.
In some countries, in England, for example, it did not flower in a pure
architectural form until the early seventeenth century, by which time
Italian architects were already moving on to the different phase of
classicism we know as Baroque.
THE BIRTH OF RENAISSANCE
FLORENCE AND BRUNELLESCHI
Florence was a city which had never forgotten the classical past of Italy. The so called
proto- Renaissance of the eleventh and twelfth centuries produced buildings designed in
seductively elegant classic style which continued to influence Florentine architects for
nearly three centuries.
 The main problem of Renaissance Florence was the problem of raising the dome on Santa
Maria Del Fiore. The expected solution of raising the dome on a wooden framework,
used in construction of vaults and arches would have been impossible.
In the end the answer came from Filippo Brunelleschi. In 1418 he and Ghilberti produced
brick models for the dome, but it was Brunessechi ’s proposal which was eventually
adopted and erected.

FILIPPO BRUNELLESCHI

Most of Brinelleschi ’s commisions came from the guild and banking circles of Florence.
For the Guild of Silk-Merchants and Goldsmiths he designed the Founding Hospital, the
first in Europe, with it ’ s elegantly arcaded loggia.
Brunelleschi ’s two large basilical churches in Florence, S. Lorenzo and S. Spirito were
designed to create an ordered harmonious balance which is a parallel to the discovery of
the laws of the perspective by Florentine painters at that moment. These churches
became models of proportional planning, since the square of the crossing is the basic
module for the whole composition.
San lorenzo
San Spirito
Palazzo Pitti

The Pazzi chapel is a building of great delicacy and subtlety, is not strictly speaking
centrally-planned since the central domed square is flanked by tunnel- vaulted side bays.
The interior is articulated with a linear pattern produced by the structural and decorative
members, made from pietra serena- local grey stone.
MICHELANGELO

Michelangelo exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Italian
Renaissance art.
Michelangelo's architectural commissions included a number that were not realized,
notably the facade for Brunelleschi's Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, for which
Michelangelo had a wooden model constructed, but which remains to this day unfinished
rough brick. At the same church, Giulio de' Medici commissioned him to design
the Medici Chapel and the tombs of Giuliano and Lorenzo Medici.
the facade of San Lorenzo in Florence
the Medici Chapel
LAURENTIAN LIBRARY BY MICHELANGELO
The Laurentian Library (Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana) is a historical library
in Florence, containing a repository of more than 11,000 manuscripts and 4,500 early
printed books. The main and the most interesting part of the interior of the library is the
staircase designed by Michelangelo.
 The staircase leads up to the reading room and takes up half of the floor of the vestibule.
The treads of the center flights are convex and vary in width, while the outer flights are
straight. The three lowest steps of the central flight are wider and higher than the others,
almost like concentric oval slabs. As the stairway descends, it divides into three flights.
The Michelangelo ’ s staircase is one more symbol of Renaissance architecture.

PALACES AND TOWN PLANNING IN PIENZA,
URBINO AND FLORENCE.
Alberti ’s influence can be felt at Pienza, near Siena, which was built in 1460 as the first
ideal city of the Renaissance. This enchanting town, surviving today in untouched
fifteenth-century form containing the cathedral, bishop ’s palace, Piccolomini palace and
town hall, all built by the Florentine architect Bernardo Rosselino. Pienza is recalled in a
beautiful architectural painting showing the piazza in an ideal town, which is often
attributed to Piero della Francesca.
 The Duke of Urbino,who transformed the capital of his tiny principality into one of the
most civilized courts in Europe concentrated his attention on the creation of the Palazzo
Ducale.

LEON BATISTA ALBERTI
Alberti was the other towering genius of the fifteenth century in architecture. He had not
been trained as an architect, but in fact he represented the new type of genius described
as the scholar, author, mathematician with a profound knowledge of all the arts.
 Alberti enshrined his conclusions about his view on architecture in treatise De re
aedificiatoria. In his book Alberti does not see architecture as the crafts, but as an
intellectual discipline and a social art in the practice of which two most necessary skills
are painting and mathematics.
 Alberti organizes his treatise round the Vitruvius dictum that good architecture consists
of three parts, Utilitas, Firmitas and Venustas( function, structure and beauty). The
beauty depends on the combination of three qualities: number, proportion and location.

Not surprisingly for someone living and working in fifteenth century Florence Alberti saw
architecture as a civic art. Alberti divided the buildings in a town into sacred and secular.
The most important building was the temple fronts with a portico and raised on a high
podium.
 Alberti ’s principal works are few: three churches, the façade of the fourth and the façade
of a Florentine palazzo.
 San Andrea is the Alberti ’s finest work, there he created a new type of a church at a
stroke by replacing the traditional aisles of the Gothic and basilican church with a series
of side-chapels.

ANDREA PALLADIO
Andrea Palladio (1508–1580) was the chief architect of the Venetian Republic, writing an
influential treatise, I quattro libri dell'architettura (Four Books on Architecture). Due to
the new demand for villas in the sixteenth century, Palladio specialized in domestic
architecture, although he also designed two beautiful and impressive churches in Venice,
San Giorgio Maggiore and Il Redentore .
 Palladio's villas are often centrally planned, drawing on Roman models of country villas.
The Villa Emo was a working estate, while the Villa Rotonda in Vicenza was an
aristocratic refuge. Both plans rely on classical ideals of symmetry, axiality, and clarity.

Villa Rotonda
San Giorgio Maggiore
DONATO BRAMANTE
THE TEMPIETTO
The so-called Tempietto is a small commemorative tomb built by Bramante, in the
courtyard of San Pietro in Montorio. Tempietto is one more symbol of Italian renaissance
architecture and it is known all over the world.
 The "Tempietto" is one of the most harmonious buildings of the Renaissance. It is the
earliest example of use of the Tuscan order in the Renaissance.

MAIN ARCHITECTURAL TERMS
MASSIVE BRICK
ELEGANT STAIRCASE
LONG FLIGHT
COZY COURTYARD
FANCIFUL ORNAMENT
LARGE PIAZZA
GRAND DOME
COMPOUND FRAMEWORK
SMALL VAULTS
TRIUMPHAL ARCH
AXIAL SYMMETRY
AXIALITY
WONDERFUL DETAIL
LATE CLASSICISM
DARK WOOD
CONSTRUCTION
SPACIOUS LOGGIA
HIGH-PITCHED ARCADE
SIDE BAY
MAIN AISLE
ANCIENT VILLA
HIGH STEP
MAIN APSE
CENTRAL NAVE
RESOURCES
 David Watkin " A History of Western Architecture "
 Fortunato, Giuseppe "The Role of Architectural Representation in the Analysis
of the Building: The 3d Survey of San Pietro in Montorio's Temple in Rome“
 " La Rotonda outside Vicenza" New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
 Lotz, Wolfgang; Howard, Deborah, Architecture in Italy, 1500-1600 (New
Haven: Yale University Press)

Rosin, Paul L.; Martin, Ralph R. "Hidden Inscriptions in the Laurentian
Library"
SOURCES
 Laurentian Library Wikipedia article
 San Pietro in Montorio Wikipedia article
MIIGAIK HONOR STATEMENT
 This review was solely written by me. In no way have I
plagiarized (represented the work of another as my own) or
otherwise violated the copyright laws and academic conventions
of fair use. I know that violations of this policy may result in my
being dismissed from Moscow State University of Geodesy and
Cartography and/or appropriate legal action being taken against
me.
Signed:
Vasiliy Kuleshov
16 March 2014