6/15 Vicenza

Not one of the structures that we saw today was from anyone other than Palladio. And to imagine that he received all of these commissions in his lifetime is staggering. He really was the counterpart to Michelangelo in Florence. With his entire lifespan coming in the 16^th century (1505-1580), Palladio was extremely influential in both his designs and his theories. The publishing of The Four Books on Architecture, written near the end of life, documented his entire collection of built work, some of which was completed posthumously. He modeled himself after Vitruvius; his idea was to attain authority in the field through great achievements in practice and theory. While he was unable to study Classical Roman architecture in Venice, he did some traveling throughout Italy and became a documentarian of antiquity. From churches, to residences, to theaters, to palaces, his work runs the gamut of a vast amount of architectural production in a manner of just 75 years.

The first building we visited today was the Olympic Theater and Academy, one of the last works designed by Palladio and completed after his death by Vincent Scamozzi in 1585. The recreation here is of an ancient Roman theater scene: the stage set is at the back of where the actors would typically perform and is noted for its use of false perspectival space. It reminds me somewhat of the Piazza del Popolo, as you can see straight down different long corridors. This instance, however, creates a trick of the eye as the scene does not actually go as far as it would seem in real life. The structure just gets shorter and the street raised vertically to give it that effect. Nevertheless it is quite an amazing streetscape, with 7 different views possible (not all at once). By this time the architect and the artist seemed to have an adequate grasp of optics and perspective, as evident in the amount of depth given to the stage set.

The façade of the structure as well is an interesting study of High to Post-Renaissance architecture. It has all of the elements necessary to be considered a revival of classical design. The cornices, dentils, columns, and Corinthian capitals are all rendered with exacting precision. Palladio does add somewhat of a twist on what you would typically expect out of architecture from antiquity. Multiple engaged Corinthian columns are grouped together in such a way that their capitals often collide, producing interesting results. This effect happens on both the upper and lower stories. In addition, the fore-most columns that would seem to want to hold up some kind of arch or heavier element above simply stop halfway up the structure and turn into pedestals for statues. This is quite an interesting twist on the typical function of columns, but is not altogether displeasing to the eye. It creates a nice undulating rhythm across the façade as well as an appropriate place to hold statues of important figures. Other rhythms created across the façade have to do with the niches that are in between these columns, featuring alternating rounded and triangular pediment sections that vary both up and down between stories and side to side across the face of the structure.

As I mentioned before, Palladio received many commissions in Vicenza. Specifically, he was charged with designing many of the famous Palazzos in the city. Keeping track of them, however, is a different story altogether. Here is the list of the ones visited today.

· Palazzo Chiericati

· Palazzo Thiene

· Palazzo Barbaran da Porto

· Basilica Palladiana

· Palazzo Valmarana-Braga

· Porto Breganza

What I found most interesting about the structures that we visited today was the amount of rustication he used throughout these designs. What I mean by that is the types of finishing materials on the exterior were sometimes overwhelming for the design itself. He does tend to stay with the tradition of keeping the Doric order below the Ionic order below the Corinthian order, and I can appreciate his willingness to stay with tradition. The exterior of the Palazzo Thiene, for example, features, in my opinion, too much rustication. I can appreciate the look he was trying to achieve on the ground floor. We’ve seen this look before: raw, uncut stones meant to give the building an imposing feel. However, the series of rectangular ‘rusticated’ stones on either side of the windows on the second story is far removed from any of the rustication schemes we have seen so far and makes the upper story feel too heavy. The upper story was normally reserved for refinement and communicating to the public that “the people who inhabit this house are better and more sophisticated than you common people”. Chalk it up to a difference in taste, but this aspect of Palladio’s signature does not make the Palazzos he designed in Vicenza feel superior to the ones we saw in Florence.

We did, however, get to visit one of his most respected and often imitated works: the Villa Rotonda. Palladio’s 1^st patron, Trissino, gave him the opportunity to study in Rome. What he came back with was a deep understanding for the Classical orders and how they should be presented. As luck would have it, in 1565 Paolo Almerico decided to retire from the Vatican and build a country house in his hometown of Vicenza. Palladio was certainly up to the task as what he produced was so well received and influential, it was put on UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites: a symmetrical, square/Greek cross plan villa, rotated 45 degrees to let each room have equal sunlight, with 4 replicating projecting facades and hexastyle porticos. Even though I do prefer some Baroque and Mannerist architecture where the Classical orders are continually played with, I also have a deep admiration for a building which stays with tradition and renders the orders with an exacting purpose and dignity. You could say that the building is somewhat unique because it acts more like a complete three-dimensional object rather than just a frontal one (as we have seen in some earlier churches). You can walk completely around the building without ever coming to the “back” of it, a feature that I approve of greatly, as a lot of the times architects will render their structures with what I personally refer to as the Diorama Effect. I understand that sometimes the constraints of a site require that the building have a frontal orientation and cannot accommodate it being free on all sides, but whenever possible I personally prefer those buildings whose attention to detail and overall composition encompasses the entire structure, not just the front. Architects, from my perspective, should design the whole building, not just part of it.