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Factum arte piranesi12/31/2022 ![]() With modern additions, which is now in the Musée du Louvre (Wilton-Ely 1002). He made one for his own funerary monument, composed of antique fragments mixed Piranesi was fascinated by the way monumental candelabra could be used as a source book for design. From similar candelabra, like the one in the collection of King Gustav III of Sweden (Wilton-Ely 995), the Newdigate Candelabra in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford (Wilton-Ely 910 and 992) or the marble candelabrum from the Jenkins collection, now in the Vatican (Wilton-Ely 935), it is safe to assume that significant interventions have been made to “perfect the object for a connoisseur’s taste”. Candelabra: an archetype adopted by Piranesi It is unknown to what extent this candelabrum is a design by Piranesi or a copy after the antique. He was more interested in the flow of ideas and less concerned with narrow subjective assertions about cultural origins. Nationalistic preoccupations recreated the Classical world in their own image: there were claims that the Etruscans were originally Greek, that Egyptian culture was corrupted by Roman influence, and Rome was simply a commercial power absorbing immigrant influences. Antiquity was reappraised along similar ideological lines. By the 1760s European power bases were being dramatically renegotiated, fashioning the idea of nation as a powerful imagined community. ![]() The Italian Peninsula was split between 11 different kingdoms, duchies, minor republics, Austrian-controlled areas and, of course, the Papacy. The ancien régime of empire was slowly giving way to the emergence of European nation states. In the second half of the eighteenth century, the cultural and political map of Europe was very different from today. But his deep respect and interrogation of the remains of antiquity led to his desire to restore, re interpret and re present those objects. He was happy to develop images, like the Vedute di Roma, that stimulated the Romantic interest in decay. This is evident in the way he responded to the fragments of antiquity he was excavating and reconstructing. For him, culture is not a dead academic subject but a living and constantly revitalised force. He argued for an inspirational response to the accumulation of cultural sources, resulting in a dynamic sense of design to reflect the needs and capabilities of the time. ![]() Piranesi directly tackled cries of “less is more” and calls for a reductive simplicity and purity. 17 The debate that dominated design and architecture in Rome in the 1760s is surprisingly like the Modernist discourse that dominated the twentieth century. No, an artist, who would do himself honour, and acquire a name, must not content himself with copying faithfully the ancients, but studying their works he ought to show himself of an inventive, and, I had almost said, of a creating Genius And by prudently combining the Grecian, the Tuscan, and the Egyptian together, he ought to open himself a road to the finding out of new ornaments and new manners. ![]() Must the genius of our artists be so basely enslaved to the Grecian manners, as not to dare to take what is beautiful elsewhere, if it be not of Grecian origin? But let us shake off this shameful yoke, and if the Egyptians, and Tuscans present to us, in their monuments, beauty, grace and elegance, let us borrow from their stock, not servilely copying from others, for this would reduce architecture and the noble arts to a pitiful mechanism, and would deserve blame instead of praise from the public, who seek for novelty, and who would not form the most advantageous idea of an artist, as was perhaps the opinion some years ago, for a good design, if it was only the copy of some ancient work. The elements were modelled in clay, cast in plaster and then carved to produce the fine detail 214 215 Plaster candelabrum with lion’s and bull’s heads From Vasi, candelabri, cippi, sarcofagi, tripodi, lucerne, ed ornamenti antichi disegnati ed incisi dal cavalier Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Rome, 1778) Wilton-Ely 912 Modelled and cast in plaster (Alamo 70) by Ángel Jorquera, Factum Arte, Madrid 220 x 75 x 75 cm 2010 Towards the close of the essay in Diverse Maniere, Piranesi makes a final plea for a new system of design, unconstrained by doctrinaire theory, but sanctioned by usage from the past and inspired by nature. Cast elements of the candelabrum in Factum Arte’s workshop. ![]()
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