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piranesi
Emil Kaufmann

1955
"Giambattista Piranesi" in Architecture in the Age of Reason

1 b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

une architecture à la fois impossible et réelle
an architecture that is both impossible and real

ce génie visionnaire, qui n'appartient pas à son temps
this visionary genius, who does not belong to his time

L'art de certains maîtres semble étranger à leur temps. . . On est tenté de croire que, nés au hasard de l'histoire, ils ne doivent rien à l'enchaînement ordinaire des causes. . . Tel est Jean-Baptiste Piranesi
The art of some masters seems foreign to their time. . . We are tempted to believe that born out of history, they owe nothing to the ordinary chain of causes. . . Such is Jean-Baptiste Piranesi.

242. Henri Focillon, Giovanni-Battista Piranesi (Paris, 1918), p. 190.
243. Ibid., pp, 286, 307.

Any period of extraordinary excitement will easily become a heyday for architectural fantasies. Just as the ecstasy of the early Renaissance was visualized by Filarete, and that of the High Baroque by the Bibbiena, so was the unrest of the eighteenth century visualized by Giovanni-Battista Piranesi. He had the same classical scene before him as those earlier architects. All started from similar models, but each took a different direction. What makes an artist is the way he transforms what he sees and experiences; architectural fantasies reveal the real trends of an era. Piranesi's etchings display, according to the masterly formulation of Henri Focillon, une architecture à la fois impossible et réelle²⁴² Focillon, however, does not seem to be right in asserting that Piranesi did not belong to his era--ce génie visionnaire, qui n'appartient pas à son temps--or in saying with still greater emphasis:

L'art de certains maîtres semble étranger à leur temps. . . On est tenté de croire que, nés au hasard de l'histoire, ils ne doivent rien à l'enchaînement ordinaire des causes. . . Tel est Jean-Baptiste Piranesi.²⁴³

Bibbiena

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