This page was created by Alexis Kratzer.  The last update was by Harith Kumte.

The Digital Piranesi

Remains of a Room Belonging to the Praetorian Fort at Hadrian’s Villa

The room shown in this engraving belongs to the same structure depicted in the previous view, and it looks as if it might be situated among the same apartments in the background. Moving from that engraving to this one, a viewer seems to be swept into the center of an image that Piranesi framed in ways that might limit imaginative entry (Verschaffel). Here, though, viewers encounter a different conflict, not between being invited and repelled by the composition, but between linearity and circularity. Many of Piranesi’s views of Tivoli in particular celebrate the enveloping effects of domed interiors: see, for example, his views of a sculpture gallery, the Temple of the Tosse, or the Temple of the God Canopus.  In this view, it is the sharp angle and heavy shading of the straight wall that dominates the visual field even as it directs viewers towards the circular area of the domed room. There, Piranesi’s etching creates wavy, pulsing marks that generate light and shadow; cross-hatching, by contrast, creates an angular texture along the surface of the straight wall. Three human figures in the middle ground, bounded by the space of the domed room, point in three different directions, as if to demarcate the boundaries of the space. Sunlight illuminates the “A” in the domed ceiling, which is paired with another at ground level to indicate the area where niches decorated the room. (JB)

To see this image in Vedute di Roma, vol 17 of Piranesi's Opere, click here.

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