Borromini, FC
ORDERBY-NAME: Borromini, Francesco Castelli
ALIAS: born Francesco Castelli
DATE OF BIRTH: September 25, 1599
PLACE OF BIRTH: Bissone, near Lugano, Italy
DATE OF DEATH: August 2, 1667
PLACE OF DEATH: Rome, Italy
DISCIPLINE: Fine art
FIELD: architecture
ASSESSMENT: Borromini was a leading architect of the Roman High Baroque period. His work was very influential in northern Italy and the Catholic areas of central Europe in the century after his death. While his work was largely ignored during the 19th century, during the late 20th century his work was once again hailed as genius by artists drawn to the irrational.
LANGUAGE/S: Italian
EDUCATION: Stonemason’s apprentice
ACHIEVEMENTS: Received honor of Office of University Architect
MAJOR-WORK/S: S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Piazza Navona
PARENTS: Giovanni Domenico Castelli
SPOUSE: none
SIBLINGS:
CHILDREN: none
LIFE AND TIMES/DETAILS: As a child Borromini was sent to Milan to learn stonecutting. In 1619, without telling his parents, he collected a debt owed to his father and moved to Rome. Once in Rome he adopted his mother’s maiden name of Borromini. His maternal uncle, Leone Garuo, let Borromini live with him and gave him a job as a stonemason’s assistant in the building works at St. Peter’s Basilica.
A distant relative of Borromino’s mother, Maderno*, was the head of works at St. Peter’s. At first Borromini worked as a craftsman, sculpting angel’s heads for the frame of the Holy Door, but Borromini soon moved from mason to architect. Maderno noticed that Borromini spent all his free time copying ancient works and those of Michelangelo*, and asked Borromini to work in his drawing office.
From the early 1620s Borromini made most of the copies of Maderno’s designs and was increasingly left to work out the decorative details on his own.
In 1624 Borromini was assigned to work on a collaborative project with Bernini*. The bronze baldacchino at the crossing of St. Peter’s Basilica was intended to merge the two disciplines of architecture and sculpture, and required specialists from both fields. At the time Bernini had no architectural experience, being primarily a sculptor and painter. This would be the last time Borromini worked as a mason.
The Palazzo Barberini provided Borromini with the most freedom to date in his career. Maderno decided on a basic concept for the palace and left Borromini to work out design specifics. Three months after construction began Maderno died (January 1629) and Bernini was appointed head architect of the project.
Borromini continued as Bernini’s subordinate. Problems began to arise for Borromini when the patron began to consult a third designer, Cortona*. Borromini strongly disagreed with the changes Cortona suggested for Maderno’s original ideas and, unable to compromise, left the project in 1631.
From 1631 to 1633 Borromini dedicated himself completely to work at St. Peter’s, where Bernini was also now the head architect. In 1632, on Bernini’s recommendation, Borromini received the honor of the Office of University Architect. With his new title, Borromini began to seek work as an independent architect.
His first commission in 1634 was the church of S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane. The small church was quite revolutionary. Borromini broke with the traditional flat front that usually defined the outermost wall of a structure. Instead, the façade moved forward and backward into both the exterior and interior limits of the façade, providing a transition between the spaces inside and outside of the building.
Borromini designed the building to work with its environment rather than separating the building from its setting. His methods were unorthodox. The undulating façade included an oval dome, a fairly new and unused form. In what would become a characteristic of his work, Borromini played concave and convex forms against each other, to create snakelike movement.
Borromini resented the little recognition he received as an architect, especially in comparison with Bernini and Cortona, who benefited both socially and financially from the privileged treatment given to artists who worked in all three disciplines of painting, sculptor, and architecture. The fact that Borromini had specialized in architecture precluded him from being seen as a “universal genius,” a quality greatly admired by the papal court.
Borromini did not receive a papal commission until he was 45. Borromini’s personality was almost the exact opposite of Bernini, who was outgoing and witty and worked easily with aristocrats and people of power. A bitter conflict arose between the two in their later years and eventually became public in 1645. Borromini was Bernini’s most outspoken critic, accusing him of being technically incompetent. Bernini countered by accusing Borromini of denying the basis of good architecture; the human body. Most architects believed that the proportions of buildings should come from the body. Borromini based his buildings on geometric shapes which he divided into geometric subunits.
Many of Borromini’s contemporaries rejected his unusual designs, calling them ugly and deformed, but his clients were generally pleased and his rapport with the prominent Spada family and Pope Innocent X kept him in work.
The years between 1646 and 1649 were the most successful of his career, when he worked on the Pope’s family palace and church in Piazza Navona.
In the 1660’s Borromini’s fortunes dramatically declined. His most ardent supporter and patron Padre Virgilio Spada died early in the decade, and his major work in Piazza Navona was taken away from him when Innocent X died. Meanwhile, his rival Bernini remained famous and successful.
In his last years Borromini suffered from severe depression and went weeks without leaving his house. He burned all his drawings. Unable to sleep or work Borromini went into a fit, grabbed a sword, and fell on it. According to his wishes, he was buried anonymously in the tomb of his teacher and friend, Maderno.
EXTRA CONNECTIONS: He influenced the work of Balthasar Neumann*
ONELINER: Francesco Borromini, leading Baroque architect
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
EB
Intituto Editoriale Electa. The Rome of Borromini: Architecture as Language. Translated by Barbara Luigia La Penta. New York: George Braziller, 1968.
Stein, Peter. “Borromini [Castelli], Francesco” The New Grove Dictionary of Art Online ed. L. Macy. retrieved June 26, 2003. http://www.groveart.com
Tansey, Richard G. and Fred S. Kleiner, ed. Gardner’s Art Through the Ages. 10th ed. New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1996.
Wittkower, Rudolf. Art and Architecture in Italy 1600-1750. Vol. 2, The High Baroque.Revised by Joseph Connors and Jennifer Montagu. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999.