Painting of the Week - The Fake Dome by Andrea Pozzo

Andrea Pozzo, The Fake Dome (I don't know if it has a formal name), 1685

The Church of Sant'Ignazio di Loyola, Rome

This post stems from various conversations I've had with people about Rome the City. Personally, I love Rome. I think it's an absolutely beautiful city with its own personality and populated by somewhat interesting people. Sure, it's got a fair share of dodgy characters, gypsies, beggars, and thieves but that's pretty much the same in any old, large and crowded European city. It is absolutely packed to the rafters with amazing art reflecting its history, particularly the Ancient pieces (natch) and the glorious Baroque period.

One of the things that came to its peak in the Baroque is illusionistic painting, known as quadratura. Quadratura, or troemp l'oeil, basically used perspective tricks to 'extend' the architecture of a building to reveal a scene in 'real' space. It is most commonly seen on church ceilings opening up to Heaven. The Church of St. Ignazio di Loyola (St. Ignatius) has two of the best examples of quadratura, executed by the Master of the style, Andrea Pozzo (1642-1709).

Pozzo had been hired by the Jesuits to paint a fresco in the nave of St. Ignazio which was built to be the church connected to their teaching academy, the Collegio Romano. Baroque architectural style of the day meant churches had a dome but, horror of horrors, it turned out they didn't have enough money allocated to build one. So instead, they PAID Pozzo to paint the ceiling as if there was a dome. And you know, he did a pretty nifty job. Of course, if you look very carefully at it, you'll realise the architectural elements are completely wrong and impossible, but the perspective holds up really well. It is not until you get to certain angles that the painting stops working, as seen below.

It's actually quite fun to stand at the wrong angle and have your brain to try figure out why it's so screwy when it was perfectly fine before. But then, I am a power nerd.