Giovanni Battista Piranesi
(Italian, 1720–1778)
The Temple of Saturn, with the Arch of Septimius Severus in the Background.
Object Details
Artist
Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Date
1774
Medium
Etching on heavy wove paper
Dimensions
Plate: 18 1/2 × 23 5/8 inches (47 × 60 cm)
Sheet: 28 × 34 3/8 inches (71.1 × 87.3 cm)
Credit Line
Gift of George Young, Jr.
Object
Number
61.002
Occurring usually near the beginning of the second volume of Piranesi’s Vedute di Roma, this plate(…)
Occurring usually near the beginning of the second volume of Piranesi’s Vedute di Roma, this plate shows two of the most famous architectural elements of the Roman forum, at far right the Temple of Saturn (labeled by Piranesi erroneously as the Temple of Concordia), and the Arch of Septimius Severus. Here, Piranesi plays with the relative scale and placement of the structures, shrinking the church of Santi Luca e Martina and moving it farther off and to the left so that its entire profile is visible, a view impossible in reality. It is conceivable that Piranesi wished to set off this church not only because of the distinguished baroque architect responsible for its dome, Pietro da Cortona, but also because of its status as home to the Accademia di San Luca, an artists’ academy founded in the sixteenth century to which Piranesi himself was elected in 1761.
(Andrew C. Weislogel, “Mirror of the City: The Printed View in Italy and Beyond, 1450–1940,” catalogue accompanying an exhibition organized by the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, curated by Andrew C. Weislogel and Stuart M. Blumin, and presented at the Johnson Museum August 11–December 23, 2012)
