Borromini

by Anthony Blunt

Overview

Francesco Borromini is one of the great geniuses of Baroque architecture, perhaps the greatest in inventiveness and in use of spatial effects. Here is the first book in English to survey the whole work of the master. The author, former Director of the Courtauld Institute of Art, is known internationally for his many works on French and Italian architecture and painting.

In this lucid and fully illustrated account, Anthony Blunt charts Borromini’s career and analyzes and assesses his art. Mr. Blunt tells of Borromini’s training, relating his style to that of Bernini, under whom he worked, and to the architecture from which he learned, for example Michelangelo’s. Borromini’s patrons allowed him freedom to evolve his own ideas, and his originality and imagination in inventing new architectural forms become apparent as the author studies individual commissions. His imagination was apparently limitless, but his inventions evolved in terms of rigidly controlled geometry. It is this combination of revolutionary inventiveness and intellectual control that gives Borromini’s work particular appeal in the twentieth century.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674079267
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	10/15/1989
Series:	Studies in Art History Paperbacks Series
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.61(d)

About the Author

Anthony Blunt was for many years Professor of the History of Art at the University of London and Director of the Courtauld Institute. He has published extensively on Baroque architecture.

Table of Contents

Foreword

1. Birth and Early Training

2. Sources and Theories

3. S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane

4. The Oratory of S. Filippo Neri and the Filomarino Altar

5. Ivo della Sapienza and S. Maria dei Sette Dolori

6. S. Giovanni in Laterano and S. Agnese in Piazza Navona

7. Domestic Architecture

8. The Last Phase

9. Influence and Reputation

Notes on Further Reading

List of Illustrations

Index

Editorial Reviews

Anthony Blunt reveals his great powers as an architectural historian. His prose is remarkably lucid and concise, even plain, yet extremely evocative.

Art in America - Edmund Leites

This full-length study by a very eminent British art historian is a valuable aid for readers interested in an up-to-date and very thorough analysis of everything Borromini did.

Raymond Sokolov

Anthony Blunt excites expectation whenever he publishes… To the delight of many readers, [his writing moves] with an absolute minimum of technical architectural vocabulary… Altogether the most lucid, sensitive, and trustworthy study of Borromini yet to appear.

Yale Review - Robert T. Petersson

Blunt has made a highly significant contribution to our understanding of Borromini’s work from his first ideas on paper to the finished buildings.

Times Literary Supplement - Bruce Boucher

Anthony Blunt excites expectation whenever he publishes...To the delight of many readers, [his writing moves] with an absolute minimum of technical architectural vocabulary...Altogether the most lucid, sensitive, and trustworthy study of Borromini yet to appear.

Yale Review

Anthony Blunt reveals his great powers as an architectural historian. His prose is remarkably lucid and concise, even plain, yet extremely evocative?

Art in America

This full-length study by a very eminent British art historian is a valuable aid for readers interested in an up-to-date and very thorough analysis of everything Borromini did.

New York Times Book Review

Blunt has made a highly significant contribution to our understanding of Borromini's work from his first ideas on paper to the finished buildings.

Times Literary Supplement

This full-length study by a very eminent British art historian is a valuable aid for readers interested in an up-to-date and very thorough analysis of everything Borromini did.

New York Times Book Review