ROCOCO AND BAROQUE

ROCOCO AND BAROQUE
BID ,AAERT,SID

• Rococo less commonly rococo, or "Late Baroque", is an 18th-century artistic
movement and style, affecting many aspects of the arts including painting,
sculpture, architecture, interior design, decoration, literature, music, and
theatre.
• The interior decoration of Rococo rooms was designed as a total work of art
with elegant and ornate furniture, small sculptures, ornamental mirrors, and
tapestry complementing architecture, reliefs, and wall paintings. The Rococo
was also important in theatre. The book The Rococo states that no other culture
"has produced a wittier, more elegant, and teasing dialogue full of elusive and
camouflaging language and gestures, refined feelings and subtle criticism" than
Rococo theatre, especially that of France.
Introduction

• It developed in the early 18th century in Paris, France as a reaction
against the grandeur, symmetry, and strict regulations of the Baroque,
especially of the Palace of Versailles. Rococo artists and architects used
a more jocular, florid, and graceful approach to the Baroque. Their style
was ornate and used light colours, asymmetrical designs, curves, and
gold. Unlike the political Baroque, the Rococo had playful and witty
themes.

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
 Although Rococo is usually thought of as developing first in the decorative
arts and interior design, its origins lie in the late Baroque architectural work of
Borromini(1599–1667) mostly in Rome and Guerin (1624–1683) mostly in
Northern Italy but also in Vienna, Prague, Lisbon, and Paris. Italian architects
of the late Baroque/early Rococo were wooed to Catholic (Southern)
Germany, Bohemia and Austria by local princes, bishops and prince-bishops.
Inspired by their example, regional families of Central European builders
went further, creating churches and palaces that took the local German
Baroque style to the greatest heights of Rococo elaboration and sensation.

 An exotic but in some ways more formal type of Rococo appeared in France
where Louis XIV's succession brought a change in the court artists and
general artistic fashion. By the end of the king's long reign, rich Baroque
designs were giving way to lighter elements with more curves and natural
patterns. These elements are obvious in the architectural designs of Nicolas
Pineal. During the Regency, court life moved away from Versailles and this
artistic change became well established, first in the royal palace and then
throughout French high society.

FURNITURE AND DECORATIVE OBJECTS
 The light-hearted themes and intricate designs of Rococo presented
themselves best at a more intimate scale than the imposing Baroque
architecture and sculpture. It is not surprising, then, that French Rococo art
was at home indoors. Metalwork, porcelain figures and especially furniture
rose to new pre-eminence as the French upper classes sought to outfit their
homes in the now fashionable style.
 Rococo style took pleasure in asymmetry, a taste that was new to European
style. This practice of leaving elements unbalanced for effect is called
contrasted.

 During the Rococo period, furniture was light-hearted, physically and visually.
The idea of furniture had evolved to a symbol of status and took on a role in
comfort and versatility. Furniture could be easily moved around for
gatherings, and many specialized forms came to be such as the fauteuil
chair, the voyeurs chair, and the Berger en gondola. Changes in design of
these chairs ranges from cushioned detached arms, lengthening of the
cushioned back and a loose seat cushion. Furniture was also freestanding,
instead of being anchored by the wall, to accentuate the light-hearted
atmosphere and versatility of each piece. Mahogany was widely used in
furniture construction due to its strength, resulting in the absence of the
stretcher as seen on many chairs of the time. Also, the use of mirrors hung
above mantels became ever more popular in light of the development of
unblemished glass.

ARCHITECTURE
 Rococo architecture, as mentioned above, was a lighter, more graceful, yet
also more elaborate version of Baroque architecture, which was ornate and
austere. Whilst the styles were similar, there are some notable differences
between both Rococo and Baroque architecture, one of them being
symmetry, since Rococo emphasised the asymmetry of forms, whilst
Baroque was the opposite.
 The styles, despite both being richly decorated, also had different themes;
the Baroque, for instance, was more serious, placing an emphasis on
religion, and was often characterized by Christian themes (as a matter of
fact, the Baroque began in Rome as a response to the Protestant
Reformation); Rococo architecture was an 18th-century, more secular,
adaptation of the Baroque which was characterized by more light-hearted
and jocular themes. Other elements belonging to the architectural style of
Rococo include numerous curves and decorations, as well as the usage of
pale colours.

 There are numerous examples of Rococo buildings as well as architects.
Amongst the most famous include the Catherine Palace, in Russia, the
Queluz National Palace in Portugal, the Augustusburg and Falkenlust
Palaces, Brühl, the Chinese House (Potsdam) the Charlotte burg Palace in
Germany, as well as elements of the Château de Versailles in France.
Architects who were renowned for their constructions using the style include
Francesco Bartolommeo Rastrelli an Italian architect who worked in Russia.
and who was noted for his lavish and opulent works, Philip de Lange, who
worked in both Danish and Dutch Rococo architecture, or Matthau's Daniel
Pöppelmann, who worked in the late Baroque style and who contributed to
the reconstruction of the city of Dresden, in Germany.

INTERIOR DESIGN
 Solitude Palace in Stuttgart and Chinese Palace in Oraniemnbau, the Bavarian
church of Wise and Sanssouci in Potsdam are examples of how Rococo made its
way into European architecture.
 In those Continental contexts where Rococo is fully in control, sportive, fantastic, and
sculptured forms are expressed with abstract ornament using flaming, leafy or shell-
like textures in asymmetrical sweeps and flourishes and broken curves; intimate
Rococo interiors suppress architectonic divisions of architrave, frieze, and cornice for
the picturesque, the curious, and the whimsical, expressed in plastic materials like
carved wood and above all stucco (as in the work of the Wessobrunner School).
Walls, ceiling, furniture, and works of metal and porcelain present a unified ensemble.
The Rococo palette is softer and paler than the rich primary colors and dark tonalities
favoured in Baroque tastes

 Rococo plasterwork by immigrant Italian-Swiss artists like Baguette and Atari is a
feature of houses by James Gibbs, and the Francine brothers working in Ireland
equalled anything that was attempted in Great Britain.
 Inaugurated in some rooms in Versailles, it unfolds its magnificence in several
Parisian buildings. In Germany, French and German artists effected the dignified
equipment of the Amalienburg near Munich, and the castles of Würzburg, Potsdam,
Charlottenburg, Brühl Brachial, Solitude, and Schönbrunn.
 In Great Britain, one of Hogarth's set of paintings forming a melodramatic morality tale
titled Marriage la Mode, engraved in 1745, shows the parade rooms of a stylish
London house, in which the only rococo is in plasterwork of the salon's ceiling.
Palladian architecture is in control. Here, on the Kantian mantel, the crowd of Chinese
vases and mandarins are satirically rendered as hideous little monstrosities, and the
Rococo wall clock is a jumble of leafy branches.

The Rococo staircase of
Gruber Palace in Ljubljana
Esterhazy in Forted,
Hungary, 1720–1766,
sometimes called the
"Hungarian Versailles"
Igreja de São Francisco
de Assis in São João del
Rei, 1749–1774, by the
Brazilian master
Aleijadinho
St. Andrew's
Church in Kiev,
1744–1767,
designed by
Francesco
Bartolommeo
Rastrelli
Capeskin Palace in
Warsaw, 1712–1721,
reflects rococo's
fascinations of oriental
architecture

INTRODUCTION
 Baroque architecture is the building style of the Baroque era, begun in
late 16th-century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance
architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often
to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and the absolutist state. It
was characterized by new explorations of form, light and shadow and
dramatic intensity.
 Whereas the Renaissance drew on the wealth and power of the Italian
courts and was a blend of secular and religious forces, the Baroque
was, initially at least, directly linked to the Counter-Reformation, a
movement within the Catholic Church to reform itself in response to the
Protestant Reformation. Baroque architecture and its embellishments
were on the one hand more accessible to the emotions and on the other
hand, a visible statement of the wealth and power of the Church. The
new style manifested itself in particular in the context of the new
religious orders, like the Teatimes and the Jesuits who aimed to improve
popular piety.

 Dissemination of Baroque architecture to the south of Italy resulted in regional
variations such as Sicilian Baroque architecture or that of Naples and Lecce. To the
north, the Teatime architect Camillo-Guarino Guaraní, Bernardo Vinton and Sicilian
born Filipe Juvarracontributed Baroque buildings to the city of Turin and
the Piedmont region.
 A synthesis of Bernini, Borromini and Crotona's architecture can be seen in the late
Baroque architecture of northern Europe which paved the way for the more
decorative Rococo style.
 By the middle of the 17th century, the Baroque style had found its secular expression
in the form of grand palaces, first in France—with the Château de Masons (1642)
near Paris by François Mansard—and then throughout Europe.
 During the 17th century, Baroque architecture spread through Europe and Latin
America, where it was particularly promoted by the Jesuits.

PRECURSORS AND
FEATURES OF BAROQUE
ARCHITECTURE
 Michelangelo's late Roman buildings, particularly St. Peter's
Basilica, may be considered precursors to Baroque
architecture. His pupil Giaconda Della Porte
 continued this work in Rome, particularly in the façade of
the Jesuit church Il Gesso, which leads directly to the most
important church façade of the early Baroque, Santa
Susanna (1603), by Carlo Madero
 Distinctive features of Baroque architecture can include:
 In churches, broader naves and sometimes given oval forms
 Fragmentary or deliberately incomplete architectural
elements
 dramatic use of light; either strong light-and-shade
contrasts (chiaroscuro effects) as at the church
of Walsenburg Abbey, or uniform lighting by means of
several windows.
 opulent use of colour and ornaments
 large-scale ceiling frescoes
 an external façade often characterized by a dramatic central
projection
 the interior is a shell for painting, sculpture and stucco
(especially in the late Baroque)
 pear-shaped domes in
the Bavarian, Czech, Polish and Ukrainian Baroque
 Marian and Holy Trinity columns erected in Catholic
countries, often in thanksgiving for ending a plague

THE BAROQUE AND COLONIALISM
 Though the tendency has been to see Baroque architecture as a European
phenomenon, it coincided with, and is integrally enmeshed with, the rise of
European colonialism. Colonialism required the development of centralized and
powerful governments with Spain and France, the first to move in this direction.
 Colonialism brought in huge amounts of wealth, not only in the silver that was
extracted from the mines in Bolivia, Mexico and elsewhere, but also in the resultant
trade in commodities, such as sugar and tobacco. The initial mismanagement of
colonial wealth by the Spaniards bankrupted them in the 16th century (1557 and
1560), recovering only slowly in the following century.
 In contrast to Spain, the French, under Jean-Baptist Colbert (1619–1683), the
minister of finance, had begun to industrialize their economy, and thus, were able to
become, initially at least, the benefactors of the flow of wealth. While this was good
for the building industries and the arts, the new wealth created an inflation, the likes of
which had never been experienced before. Rome was known just as much for its new
sumptuous churches as for its vagabonds.
During the Portuguese
colonization of Goa, India
brought about many churches
with baroque architecture (our
lady of the Immaculate
Conception Church).

RELIGIOUS (ECCLESIAL) BAROQUE
•The Catholic Church and monastic orders built larger edifices.
Saint Peter and
Paul Church
in Baja, Hungary
Church
in Tata, Hungary
Minority church in Eger, Hungary

HOUSES
A street in the old town
of Sopron, Hungary
An old pharmacy in
Kaposvár, Hungary
Another street
in Sopron, Hungary
The city hall of Pecs,
Hungary
A house built in
Baroque
in Papa, Hungary
A Baroque house in
Budapest, Hungary

•OTHERS(CASTLES, PLEAS ANT'S HOUSES
•Old castlaes were re-edified in Baroque just for the comforts of
that age.
Typical Hungarian
Baroque peasant's
houses in Halász,Hung
ary
The Siklós Castle in
Siklós, Hungary

ABHISHEK MEWADA(1432)
SUBMITTED BY:-

ROCOCO AND BAROQUE

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