Giacomo Quarenghi
Giuseppe Poli
Giacomo Quarenghi (Italian pronunciation: Imperial Russia, particularly in Saint Petersburg. He brought into vogue an original monumental style, of Palladian inspiration, which was a reference for many architects who worked in Russia as well as the Grand Duchy of Finland.
He has been described as "the last of the great architects of Italy".[1]
Career in Italy
Born in
Tiepolo. Young Quarenghi was well-educated and widely read. Travelling through Italy he visited Vicenza, Verona, Mantua and Venice, the places where he made the longest stays. He made drawings of the Greek temples at Paestum (Loukomski 1928) and finally arrived in Rome in 1763, at a moment when Neoclassicism was being developed in advanced artistic circles. He studied painting with Anton Raphael Mengs, then with Stefano Pozzi, later moving to study architecture (1767–69) with a traditionalist Late Baroque architect Paolo Posi
.
Then he came upon a copy of
Quattro Libri d'archittetura. "You could never believe," he wrote to his friend and long-term correspondent Marchesi, "the impression that this book made. Then it struck me that I had every reason to consider myself badly guided" before that point (Loukomsky 1928). He turned for new, Neoclassical instruction to Antoine Decrezet, a friend of Winckelmann
, and the former's pupil Niccola Giansimoni, measuring and drawing the antiquities of Rome.
In Venice (1771–1772), where he was studying the works of Palladio, Quarenghi came into contact with a British lord passing through there on the
Campidoglio, and designs for Clement's tomb (later executed by Antonio Canova
).
His work in Italy and for English clients formed enough of a reputation that in 1779 he was selected by the Prussian-born count Rieffenstein, who had been commissioned by
Catherine II of Russia to send her two Italian architects to replace her French ones (Loukomsky 1928). Despite having just designed a manege in Monaco and a dining hall for the Archduchess of Modena
, 35-year-old Quarenghi seems to have felt himself underemployed, given the number of architects then working in Italy and the dearth of commissions from the church and nobility. He accepted Rieffenstein's offer without hesitation and left with his pregnant wife for St Petersburg.
Career under Catherine II
National Museum in Warsaw
.Quarenghi's first important commission in Russia was the
Tsarskoe Selo, where he would supervise the construction of the Alexander Palace
, the most ambitious of his undertakings to date.
Appointed to the post of
Catherine II's court architect, Quarenghi went on to produce a prodigious number of designs for the Empress, her successors and members of her court: houses, summerhouses, bridges, theatres, hospices, a market, a bank building, interior decorations and garden designs. His projects were put into execution as far away from the capital as Novhorod-Siverskyi, Ukraine
where a cathedral was constructed to his designs.
In
Nicholas Sheremetev engaged him to devise a theatre hall in the Ostankino Palace and a semicircular colonnade for the Sheremetev Hospital. Most of Quarenghi's designs intended for Moscow were subsequently realized with significant modifications by other architects, as was the case with Gostiny Dvor (1789–1805), Catherine Palace
(1782–87), and Sloboda Palace (1790–94).
Career under Paul and Alexander I
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Maltese knights
under his protection, Quarenghi also joined the Order and served as its official architect until 1800. His commissions became less frequent, as the monotonous rhythm of solemn colonnades and the laconic clarity of symmetrical compositions appeared boring to those courtiers who had found Quarenghi's designs so delightful a decade earlier.
Under such circumstances, he visited Italy in 1801 and was given a triumphant welcome. He turned his attention to
metalwork executed for imperial residences, particularly the Winter Palace
.
With the enthronement of
Canova
proclaiming that "good sense and judgment shouldn't be enslaved by commonly accepted rules and models".
Giacomo Quarenghi was granted
Order of St. Vladimir
of the First Degree in 1814. After 1808 he lived largely in retirement as a celebrity. Of his thirteen children by two wives, a few chose to remain in Russia, while others returned to Italy. He died at age 72 in Saint Petersburg.
When the 150th anniversary of his death was being marked in 1967, the remains of Quarenghi were moved from the Volkov Cemetery to the
Assignation Bank and Bank Bridge
in Saint Petersburg.
Works in St Petersburg
- 1782–83 – the Collegium of Foreign Affairs on the English Embankment;
- 1782–87 – St. Mary's Hospital in Pavlovsk;
- 1783–84 – the Bezborodko Country House in Polyustrovo;
- 1783–87 – the Hermitage Theatre, the only surviving 18th-century theatre in St Petersburg, inspired to the Palladio's Teatro Olimpico of Vicenza. The designs of Quarenghi's theatre were engraved and published in 1787, giving him a European reputation;
- 1783–89 – the Academy of Sciences on the University Embankment;
- 1783–89 – the Russian Assignation Bankon Sadovaya Street;
- 1784–87 – the Silver Rows on Nevsky Prospekt;
- 1786 – wrought-iron bridge in Tsarskoye Selo;
- 1787–92 – the Raphael Loggia in the Winter Palace;
- 1789–96 – the Main Apothecary on Millionaya Street;
- 1784–86 – the Saltykov house on the Field of Mars;
- 1788–90 – the Vietinghoff house on Admiralty Prospect;
- 1790 – the Yusupov house on Sadovaya Street;
- 1791 – the belfry of the Vladimirskaya Church;
- 1792–96 – the Alexander Palace, designed for St Petersburg but simplified when it was erected in the Alexander Park of Tsarskoye Selo; pavilions in the landscape part of the Catherine Park, including the Concert Hall pavilion (1782 – 1786/88), the Kitchen Ruins (1780s), the Hall on the Island (1794);
- 1797–1800 the Maltese Chapel at the Vorontsov Palace;
- 1803–05 – St. Mary's Hospital for the Poor on Liteiny Prospect;
- 1804–07 – the Catherine Institute on the Russian National Library);
- 1803–09 – the Imperial Cabinet of the Anichkov Palace on Nevsky Prospect;
- 1806–08 – the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens (illustrated, to the right);
- 1804–07 – the Cavalry Manege, or Riding Academy on St Isaac's Square (1804–07);
- 1814 – the Narva Triumphal Gate, later replaced by a permanent structure to a design by Vasily Stasov;
- 1814–16 – the Anglican Church on the English Embankment.
References
- ^ Christopher Marsden. Palmyra of the North. Faber and Faber Limited, 1942. 2nd edition. Page 10.
- ^ Historic England. "Wardour Castle Chapel (1300093)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 25 June 2020.
- Taleporovsky V.N. Кваренги. Leningrad-Moscow, 1954.
- Grimm G.G. Кваренги. Leningrad, 1962.
- Disegni di Giacomo Quarenghi. (Exhibition catalogue), Venice, 1967 (Contents).
- Pilyavsky V.I. Джакомо Кваренги: Архитектор. Художник. Leningrad, 1981.
- Giacomo Quarenghi: architetto a Pietroburgo: Lettere e altri scritti. Venice, 1988.
- Fabbriche e disegni di Giacomo Quarenghi. Bergamo, 1994 (reprint of 1821 edition).
- Giacomo Quarenghi: Architetture e vedute. Milano, 1994.
External links
- Anno Q (in Italian)
- Giacomo Quarenghi – The Master of Neoclassicism in the Bicentenary of Death (in Polish)
- Guide to Quarenghi on-line
- Giacomo Quarenghi at Find a Grave
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