©MarinaDeFranceschini - Progetto Accademia
Part 5 - Villa Adriana and architecture
Model and source of inspiration for artists, antique dealers, architects and archaeologists of all times
The ruins of Villa Adriana, still so impressive after nineteen hundred years (Hadrian became emperor in 117 AD), have fascinated architects and artists of all ages.
They visited the Villa in search of inspiration, to copy the shapes of the buildings and discover the secrets of its building techniques, since its walls were still so solid after centuries of abandonment.
Villa Adriana was visited by many of the greatest artists of the Renaissance, as explained in Marina De Franceschini's last book, “Villa Adriana. Academy. Hadrian's Secret Garden, History of the Excavations, Ancient Sources and Antiquarian Studies from the XV to the XVII Centuries”. [FIG. 10 ]
Fig. 10 - Accademia. Hadrian's Secret Garden
by Marina De Franceschini
We mention some of the most important and famous: Francesco di Giorgio Martini, Baldassarre Peruzzi, Antonio and Giuliano da Sangallo, Leonardo da Vinci, Andrea Palladio, Michelangelo Buonarroti and later on Francesco Borromini and Antonio Canova, to name just a few.
Sometimes they have left their signatures on the vaults of the cryptoporticoes, such as Giovanni da Udine, Pier Leone Ghezzi, Giovan Battista Piranesi and Giacomo Quarenghi.
Villa Adriana therefore became a model and archetype of the great Renaissance architecture, especially for the large country residences of Popes, Cardinals or nobles of the Roman aristocracy.
It is certainly no coincidence that one of the first and most famous Renaissance villas, the Villa d'Este [FIG. 11], was built in nearby Tivoli.
Just as it is no coincidence that in the historical period that saw the rediscovery of antiquity and classical art, the Roman architectural and artistic language learned at Villa Adriana was taken up and reinterpreted in new palaces and villas, which belonged to the most important Roman families linked to the nobility and the Church.
Fig. 11: The Villa d'Este at Tivoli
The Renaissance villa as an image and expression of power and wealth found new life in those prestigious country mansions.
This “fashion” soon reached the royal courts of France, Spain, England, Russia, Poland and the rest of Europe. Making Hadrian's Villa practically “immortal”; more and more foreigners came to visit it.
In the eighteenth century, in fact, Villa Adriana and Tivoli became one of the most important destinations of the Grand Tour, the educational journey of European nobles to discover Italian art and culture.
And at the same time, it became a “must” in the training and studies of architects, including the pensionnaires of the French Academy in Rome, such as Charles-Louis Clérisseau and Pierre-Adrien Pâris, who have left us precious documentation on the current state of the ruins with and get up. Also English architects like Robert Adam or Danes like Kaspar Harsdorff.
Even modern architects, for example Le Corbusier, have studied the Villa, which has always been a source of learning and inspiration for everyone.
Many artists have depicted Villa Adriana in engravings and paintings, especially in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, then photography arrived.
This historical documentation has yet to be studied systematically, highlighting the great importance and influence that Villa Adriana had on Renaissance and modern art and architecture.
©MarinaDeFranceschini - Progetto Accademia