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piranesi
Vincenzo Fasolo

1956
The Campo Marzio of G. B. Piranesi

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A more analytical reading, generating from the more flamboyant aspects of his pictorial work, may help us to understand and resolve the proposed problem.

Piranesi, meanwhile, demonstrates, in certain designs and sketches of idealized architectural inventions, his knowledge of forms, of fundamental architectural forms, of the rules of classical architecture as well as the architecture of the 16th century, especially the Venetian--Palladian and Sansovinian--all infused with an enlightened [bibbienesco] spirit.

A project for a temple in 1743 is rigorously designed and engraved, with the following commentary. Gio. Batt. Piranesi, Arch. inv. and designed this in Rome, in the year 1743. The caption states:

The floor of this temple is notably elevated from the ground: note also in the center of the round cell that so is the whole great vase of the temple itself: four loggias led to it, and through as many stairs one ascended to it. The walls of this great temple are composed of two orders, and over the second curves a vast cupola with coffers and rosettes.

It is a vast, circular hall, inspired by the Pantheon, which encircles an open colonnade connected to the rotunda, in the center of which is the great altar on which the inextinguishable sacred fire was perpetuated by the Vestal Virgins. This colonnade is tied into the perimeter walls by four portico wings forming a cross.

The complex unfolds not concentrically, as may appear at first glance, but with a shifting of the respective centers of the two rings. The concept seems so precise--and the perspective rendering confirms this--that one cannot but admit that the artist has proceeded with a technically fastidious disposition of his sketch, that is to say with floor plans and projections, with the sensibility and rules of an architect. Some adjustments in effect do not modify the observations just made. This is the work of a 20-year-old, but his knowledge of the form of the "Corinthian Order" is perfect in all its references and details. We shall have to return to this project as one demonstrating a foundation of concepts that will characterize the Piranesian architectural invention in a very particular way. It is a beginning moment which reveals a mind technically organized for architecture. Other studies of ideal architecture show a firm knowledge of classical form. A sketch of an architectural invention, having a scenographic aspect even in the immediacy its line work, shows a mastery over forms, in this case Sansovinian. Building designs from 1743 follow the taste and style of re-creations of classical surroundings: "Great Corinthian hall"; "Ideal form of the ancient Campidoglio"; "Magnificent place of architecture"; "Doric atrium". These are the plates that connect with the Prima parte di architettura e prospettive inventate e incise da G. B. Piranesi, architetto veneziano.

First part of the architectures and perspectives invented and engraved by G. B. Piranesi, Venetian architect

A sketch for a great porticoed square dominated by a triumphal arch shows his command of compositions of strict Roman provenance, more notable if one makes connections to analogous themes developed by his contemporaries or neighbors, especially Juvarra. Even the "Carceri", which in their totality are nothing but a poetic and romantic vision with pictorial and resplendent ends, are composed with a well reasoned rigor and with linked mural structures: the interlacing of arches and vaults unfold in a resolved framework, in mural networks arranged with an architectural logic that makes possible a projection of the structural scheme.

Nor is it of interest, for this enterprise, to echo what has already been done by Focillon in retracing, in the specific theme of the "Carceri", the original formal elements found in Etruscan sources, in ruins, in enormous wall constructions, even in those elements of the Venetian baroque that play with rustic bossing.

Even in these visions the temper of the architect is manifested in the modeling of the secondary architectural details, in the weight and cut of the stone, particularly observed in the reproduction of bridges, on which Piranesi lingers attracted by their antique structure (the Cestio and Lucano bridges).

A feeling for materials and an attraction to Roman monuments, enduring exactly because of the vitality expressed by their function in the resolution of static forces, reveals itself in Piranesi at times like the reasoning of figuration, undertaken with the pleasure of a builder.

Such is the case with the Mausoleum of Hadrian: the buttressing creates an architectural motif for the alternation of oblique and curved spurs, and for the progression of powerful plinths: the whole framework is taken from a pre-selected motif, like a stand-alone composition.

The ruin on the Appian Way grows and takes its own form. Besides the interest of the form assumed by the ruin as a complete unity, the artistic interest of the design lies, again, in the analysis and revelation of its memorial structures.

Again in the plates of the sluice gates of Albano: it is a gigantic work, accentuated by a knowing appreciation of its references, by the pressures of the architraves and the arches, which excites the artist in those senses that belong to the architect that knows how to grasp the language of the material and the vibrations of its associations with living things.

The measure of the potential "architecture" in Piranesi is given to us by the great head-butt that is the volume of engravings of Il Campo Marzio. The work is from the years 1761-62, contemporary, then, to the Magnificenze dell'Architettura dei Romani, and follows the studies of Le Antichità Romane from 1756. The large plate (open book dimensions of 1 meter by 1.5 meters) is examined with curiosity, and one is surprised by the complicated interlacing of singular buildings. It is a plan view of the reconstruction of the Campomarzio area.

On this great page, one can say, the attention of scholars has always been completely distracted, and only the chronological ordering of the Piranesian opus revealed the dense dedicative frontispiece: Roberto Adam - britannico architecturae - cultori Ichnographiam Campi Martii antiquae Urbis - Johannes Baptista Piranesius - in sui amoris argomentatum.

There is nothing archeological in this plan. Only the curve of the Tiber and some generic indication tells us that the place is Rome. The designation of places appear here and there: "Horti Salustani", "Horti Luciliani", "Horti Neroniani", "Bustum Caesaris Augusti" and "Area Marti"; "Horti prius pompeiani dein Marci Antoni", "Forum M. Aureli", "Circus Agonalis sive Alexandri", "Horti Getae", "Horti Domitiae", which recall to us the Roman topography but for which our current knowledge can find no adequate correlation.

Archeological knowledge in Piranesi's time was just beginning. There was great interest in antiquities, but certain denominations, attributions, locations of monuments, were based only and prevalently on literary sources: the topographic inaccuracies should then not surprise us.

It is surprising, however, that monumental elements whose location, if not denomination, was certain, were subordinated, or moved, or in any case made the base for systemizations that are out of proportion to the spaces actually available or estimated in their original state by the expert eye of the architect.

Of the above we will shortly give an account, as we make an appraisal of the spirit and finality of the Piranesian creation through his Campomarzio. Which reveals to us, in the meantime, a mature knowledge in contact with the antique world and an intuition for how life was lived in the imperial city, its character, albeit somewhat exalted by admiration.

Piranesi captures the solemnity of the public buildings that are representative of public life: the forums, the sacred places of the Gods, the places consecrated to the memory of the emperors, the tombs.
Fasolo's statement regarding the Ichnographia's lack of "archeology" was echoed when Tafuri said "the archeological mask of Piranesi's Campo Marzio fools no one." Tafuri goes on to say the Ichnograpia "is an experimental design and the city, therefore, remains an unknown."

Both Fasolo and Tafuri are here wrong. Anyone that has read Piranesi's Il Campo Marzio texts, (including the indexed evidence of 312 ruins within the Campo Marzio and the approximately 1000 literary references to 323 individual buildings, gardens, arches, obelisks, sepulchers, etc.), and redrawn the plan wall for wall and column for column will resolutely testify that Piranesi's Campo Marzio is not only a knowable city, but also an exceptional representation of Rome's Campo Marzio from Romulus to Honorius.

A fair share of the plans within the Ichnographia bear Piranesi's signature, of that there is no doubt. Remaining largely unrecognized, however, are the strict parameters within which Piranesi manifests his creativity, and even his "new ideas" aim to deliver clearer notions of the Imperial capital and its unique urban (design) narrative.

"Authenticity is one thing, veracity another."
--Marguerite Yourcenar

Fasolo here brings to mind the ideas regarding the philosophy of history found in Giambattista Vico's Scienza nuova.

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