THE
ITALIAN ARCHITECT-ANDREA PALLADIO
A new exhibition celebrates Palladio’s
architecture 500 years on
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Vicenza is a
pleasant, prosperous city in the Veneto, 60 km west of Venice. Its grand
families settled and farmed the area from the 16th century. But its
principal claim to fame is Andrea Palladio, who is such an influential
architect that a neoclassical style is known as Palladian. The city is a
permanent exhibition of some of his finest buildings, and as he was born —
in Padua, to be precise — 500 years ago, the International Centre for the
Study of Palladio’s Architecture has an excellent excuse for mounting la
grande mostra, the big show.
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The
exhibition has the special advantage of being held in one of Palladio’s
buildings, Palazzo Barbaran da Porto. Its bold facade is a mixture of
rustication and decoration set between two rows of elegant columns. On the
second floor the pediments arc alternately curved or pointed, a Palladian
trademark. The harmonious proportions of the atrium at the entrance lead
through to a dramatic interior of fine fireplaces and painted ceilings.
Palladio’s design is simple, clear and not over-crowded. The show has been
organised on the same principles, according to Howard Bums, the
architectural historian who co-curated it.
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Palladio’s
father was a miller who settled in Vicenza, where the young Andrea was
apprenticed to a skilled stonemason. How did a humble miller’s son become a
world renowned architect? The answer in the exhibition is that, as a young
man, Palladio excelled at carving decorative stonework on columns, doorways
and fireplaces. He was plainly intelligent, and lucky enough to come across
a rich patron, Gian Giorgio Trissino, a landowner and scholar, who
organised his education, taking him to Rome in the 1540s, where he studied
the masterpieces of classical Roman and Greek architecture and the work of
other influential architects of the time, such as Donato Bramante and
Raphael.
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Burns argues
that social mobility was also important. Entrepreneurs, prosperous from agriculture
in the Veneto, commissioned the promising local architect to design their
country villas and their urban mansions. In Venice the aristocracy were
anxious to co-opt talented artists, and Palladio was given the chance to
design the buildings that have made him famous – the churches of San
Giorgio Maggiore and the Redentore, both easy to admire because the can be
seen from the city’s historical centre across a stretch of water.
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He tried his
hand at bridges — his unbuilt version of the Rialto Bridge was decorated
with the large pediment and columns of a temple — and, after a fire at the
Ducal Palace, he offered an alternative design which bears an uncanny
resemblance to the Banqueting House in Whitehall in London. Since it was
designed by Inigo Jones, Palladio’s first foreign disciple, this is not as
surprising as it sounds.
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Jones, who
visited Italy in 1614, bought a trunk full of the master’s architectural
drawings; they passed through the hands of the Dukes of Burlington and
Devonshire before settling at the Royal Institute of British Architects in
1894. Many are now on display at Palazzo Barbaran. What they show is how
Palladio drew on the buildings of ancient Rome as models. The major theme
of both his rural and urban building was temple architecture, with a strong
pointed pediment supported by columns and approached by wide steps.
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Palladio s
work for rich landowner alienates unreconstructed critics on the Italian
left but among the papers in the show are designs for cheap housing in
Venice. In the wider world, Palladio’s reputation has been nurtured by a
text he wrote and illustrated, “Quattro Libri dell’ Architettura”. His
influence spread to St Petersburg and to Charlottesville in Virginia, where
Thomas Jefferson commissioned a Palladian villa he called Monticello.
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Vicenza’s
show contains detailed models of the major buildings and is leavened by
portraits of Palladio’s teachers and clients by Titian, Veronese and
Tintoretto; the paintings of his Venetia buildings are all by Canaletto, no
less. This is an uncompromising exhibition; many of the drawings are small
and faint, and there are no sideshows for children, but the impact of
harmonious lines and satisfying proportions is to impart in a viewer a
feeling of benevolent calm. Palladio is history’s most therapeutic
architect.
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“Palladio,
500 Anni: La Grande Mostra” is at Palazzo Barbaran da Porto, Vicenza, until
January 6th 2009. The exhibition continues at the Royal Academy of Arts, London,
from January 31st to April 13th, and travels afterwards to Barcelona and
Madrid.
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Question 1 – 7
Do the following statements agree with
the information given in Reading Passage 1? In boxes 1-7 on your answer
sheet, write
TRUE
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if the
statement agrees with the information
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FALSE
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if the
statement contradicts the information
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NOT GIVEN
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if there is no information on
this
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1
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The building
where the exhibition is staged has been newly renovated.
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Palazzo
Barbaran da Porto typically represents the Palladio’s design.
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Palladio’s father worked as an
architect.
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Palladio’s
family refused to pay for his architectural studies.
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Palladio’s alternative design
for the Ducal Palace in Venice was based on an English building.
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Palladio
designed for both wealthy and poor people.
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The exhibition includes
paintings of people by famous artists.
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Questions 8-13
Complete the sentences below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage
for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 8-13 on
your answer sheet.
8
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What job was
Palladio training for before he became an architect?
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9
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Who arranged
Palladio’s architectural studies?
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10
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Who was the first non-Italian
architect influenced by Palladio?
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11
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What type of
Ancient Roman buildings most heavily influenced Palladio’s work?
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12
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What did Palladio write that
strengthened his reputation?
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13
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In the
writer’s opinion, what feeling will visitors to the exhibition experience?
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