Painting in Stone - Architecture Poetics of Marble From Antiquity to Enlightenment

A sweeping history of premodern architecture told through the material of stoneSpanning almost five millennia, Painting in Stone tells a new history of premodern architecture through the material of precious stone. Lavishly illustrated examples include the synthetic gems used to simulate Sumerian and Egyptian heavens; the marble temples and mansions of Greece and Rome; the painted palaces and polychrome marble chapels of early modern Italy; and the multimedia revival in 19th-century England. Poetry, the lens for understanding costly marbles as an artistic medium, summoned a spectrum of imaginative associations and responses, from princes and patriarchs to the populace. Three salient themes sustained this "lithic imagination": marbles as images of their own elemental substance according to premodern concepts of matter and geology; the perceived indwelling of astral light in earthly stones; and the enduring belief that colored marbles exhibited a form of natural-or divine-painting, thanks to their vivacious veining, rainbow palette, and chance images.

Product details

• Authors: Fabio Barry, Barry Fabio
• Publisher: Yale University Press Ltd
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 31.12.2020
• EAN: 9780300248173
• ISBN: 978-0-300-24817-3
• No. of pages: 432
• Dimensions: 215 mm x 280 mm x 25 mm
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Art > Art history; ARCHITECTURE / Design, Drafting, Drawing & Presentation, Architectural structure & design, ARCHITECTURE / History / General, History of art: Byzantine & Medieval art c 500 CE to c 1400, History of Architecture, baroque, Renaissance art, Art & design styles: Baroque, Renaissance style, BCE to c 500 CE, BCE period – Protohistory, Architectural structure and design, Medieval style, rococo