Impression and Memory: Monumental Architecture in the Italian Renaissance
(2020) Society of Architectural Historians Annual International Conference (online)
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- In Late-medieval and early modern discussions on magnificent architecture, authors often emphasized the religious and political advantages of large and expensive buildings. When beholders look upon magnificent buildings, their minds are suspended in admiration, which leads them towards submission and respect. Colossal scale in ecclesiastical buildings and princely palaces was therefore recommended. Upon seeing enormous buildings, beholders would be moved towards religious devotion and respect for political rule. This paper focuses on the intellectual tradition on magnificence, admiration and its effects as a means to reflect upon the condition of monumentality in the Italian Renaissance. It sketches this intellectual tradition as it evolved in late medieval political literature, as well as the reflections formulated upon this tradition in architectural treatises of the fifteenth century. In a second part, I focus on the project that pope Julius II set up for Saint Peter's in Rome at the start of the sixteenth century. This paper thus sketches renaissance attitudes towards monumentality in both words and deeds. As I argue, these attitudes were at the same time straightforward and complex, and point towards the dangers and pitfalls inherent to monumentality itself, both as an architectural quality and in terms of the political purposes, it often hopes to serve.
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De Raedt, N. (2020). Impression and Memory: Monumental Architecture in the Italian Renaissance. Society of Architectural Historians Annual International Conference (online). https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/103905