"A definitive modern study of Filippo Brunelleschi's buildings, based on detailed archaeological investigation of the monuments and new exhaustive studies in the Florentine archives, has long been needed. This sequel to the author's Filippo Brunelleschi: The Cupola of Santa Maria del Fiore (1980) answers that need. It makes a major contribution to our understanding of the creation of Renaissance architecture and of fifteenth-century patronage. In Filippo Brunelleschi: The Buildings Professor Saalman not only gives new insights into the physical fabric of Brunelleschi's projects, but reinterprets every one of his buildings on the basis of previously unpublished archival evidence and in the light of modern historical research on Early Renaissance Florence. The result is a monograph that reassesses Brunelleschi's architectural work in the context of the political, economic and religious environment of early fifteenth-century Florence. The author reexamines Brunelleschi's personal style of designing details and of managing the quantity and disposition of light in his metrically and geometrically proportioned spaces. Major chapters deal with the role of leading patrons, the Barbadori in their chapel in Santa Felicita, Cosimo de' Medici at San Lorenzo, Andrea Pazzi at the chapter house of the Pazzi in the convent of Santa Croce and the Scolari at the Angeli rotunda. An extensive selection of documents is provided in addition to the short excerpts quoted in the main text. The picture of Brunelleschi that emerges confirms earlier views of him as a traditionalist with an all'antica language. But the reader will find here a new dimension of historical precision in the definition of this much studied architect. Clear lines of demarcation are drawn between the work of Filippo and that of major contemporaries such as Michelozzo de Bartolommeo and, in particular, Leon Battista Alberti. We return at the end of the twentieth century to Filippo Brunelleschi's buildings to learn fundamental lessons about the craft and the profession. There is a universal element in his work: integrity - integrity of design, integrity of structure, integrity of detail. There are no false notes, no easy solutions, no slip-shod details. His buildings do not shout for attention: they command it silently through flawless execution and understated monumentality. They do not lend themselves to facile appreciation, but demand careful study and rigorous thought to be fully understood and enjoyed. A man throughly of his time and place, Filippo - like Mes van der Rohe - strove for simplicity, clarity, perfection. It is what makes him relevant to architects today." --

Joining the bestsellers Longitude and Galileo’s Daughter, a lively and intriguing tale of two artists whose competitive spirit brought to life one of the world’s most magnificent structures and ignited the Renaissance The dome of the Santa Maria del Fiore, the great cathedral of Florence, is among the most enduring symbols of the Renaissance, an equal to the works of Leonardo and Michelangelo. Its designer was Filippo Brunelleschi, a temperamental architect and inventor who rediscovered the techniques of mathematical perspective. Yet the completion of the dome was not Brunelleschi’s glory alone. He was forced to share the commission with his archrival, the canny and gifted sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti. In this lush, imaginative history—a fascinating true story of artistic genius and personal triumph—Paul Robert Walker breathes life into these two talented, passionate artists and the competitive drive that united and dived them. As it illuminates fascinating individuals from Donatello and Masaccio to Cosimo de’Medici and Leon Battista Alberti, The Feud That Sparked the Renaissance offers a glorious tour of 15th-century Florence, a bustling city on the verge of greatness in a time of flourishing creativity, rivalry, and genius.

"The Fat Woodworker" is a delightful story in the tradition of the Italian Renaissance "beffe," stories of practical, often cruel jokes. It is the tale of a prank engineered by the great Renaissance architect, Filippo Brunelleschi (1377-1446), played upon an unsuspecting (and perhaps less-than-brilliant) friend and woodworker named Manetto, in reprisal for the woodworker's social slight. While the prank is indeed cruel, it is so ingenious, and the victim is so comical, that the reader soon forgets the architect's - and the author's - malice and settles in for a delightful turn as part of the unfolding conspiracy set in motion by Brunelleschi's circle of friends. The tale brings the reader into the social world of Florence's craft- and tradespeople, its lawyers and judges, artists, architects and intellectuals and gives a vibrant sense of the city's close-knit social fabric, its packed streets and busy shops and offices. It is as much a portrait of the Renaissance city as of one very befuddled and delightful woodworker. Robert and Valerie Martone provide a solid contemporary translation that carries across the ironic distance of the original. They include an introduction to the story, its author and genre, and to the social and intellectual world of Brunelleschi and Renaissance Florence. Illustrated, introduction, bibliography. Fiction

Excerpt from Filippo Di Ser Brunellesco It is very difficult to obtain enough data for an authentic life of Filippo di Ser Brunellesco. In writing the life of a painter, his own works are before us just as he painted them, and they unerringly reveal the genius and character of the man. A sculptors statues and reliefs also show us visibly his own handiwork untouched by any sacrilegious hand but the gentle one of time; the music of a composer who lived a hundred years ago, is with us still as he conceived it; and the thoughts of the poet or philosopher are embalmed in their own language within the leaves of their books. But with an architect like Brunelleschi the case is different. His designs were changed even in the hands that continued them on his death; his buildings were restored(?) by subsequent architects and incongruous bits inserted in them, like Ammannati's Roman pediments inserted to Brunelleschi's grand arched doorways in the Pitti. Beyond the Pazzi chapel and the old sacristy of San Lorenzo, which Brunelleschi finished during his lifetime, I believe there is not another work of his by which a modem critic could fairly judge his design. Thus, the works which should best illustrate his nobility of conception are now more misleading than convincing in their evidence. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Reproduction of the original: The Cathedral Builders by Leader Scott

"Garrard, one of a small handful of truly distinguished feminist art historians, presents a detailed and visually convincing account of the relationship between nature and art in all its fraught and gendered cultural meaning from antiquity on. Brunelleschi's Egg constitutes an exemplary feat of interdisciplinary study that requires no specialized theoretical baggage to follow and emulate."--Mieke Bal, author of Of What One Cannot Speak: Doris Salcedo's Political Art "Mary Garrard's discerning eye and deep knowledge of Renaissance art informs this fascinating book. She offers a sophisticated exploration of a rich artistic conversation on the relationship of nature and art, describing the central role of gender in structuring artists' complex and changing attitudes toward nature. Brunelleschi's Egg is so much more than a history of style; it maps the changing mindsets of Renaissance society in the several centuries during which scientific developments gradually seized masculine authority, relegating both art and nature to mastered femininity. This book provides new perspective on Italian Renaissance masterworks; it will be central to future discussion of Renaissance art." --Margaret R. Miles, author of A Complex Delight: The Secularization of the Breast, 1350-1750 "In this sweeping study, the magnum opus of one of feminist art history's founding mothers, Mary Garrard extends the gendered critique of art into the realms of philosophy and science, psychology and myth. Her eloquently prophetic and richly detailed synthesis chronicles western culture's increasing feminization of nature and art, and its parallel masculinization of the human mind (both male and female), as a Renaissance tragedy on an epic scale. The book is a must-read for historians of the early modern period, with a theme also of urgent contemporary concern."--James M. Saslow, author of Pictures and Passions: A History of Homosexuality and Art "A completely new and thoroughly convincing way of looking at the major monuments of the Italian Renaissance. The ideas in Brunelleschi's Egg are so compelling that it is hard to imagine a reader who would not be drawn into the analysis."--Jacqueline Marie Musacchio, author of Art, Marriage, and Family in the Italian Renaissance Palace "Garrard offers an unprecedented perspective on an amazing plethora of seminal works. Written beautifully, Brunelleschi's Egg is nothing but exemplary."--Yael Even, University of Missouri, St. Louis

This book provides a reassessment of the theory of magnificence in light of the related social virtue of splendour. Author James Lindow highlights how magnificence, when applied to private palaces, extended beyond the exterior to include the interior as a series of splendid spaces where virtuous expenditure could and should be displayed. Examining the fifteenth-century Florentine palazzo from a new perspective, Lindow's groundbreaking study considers these buildings comprehensively as complete entities, from the exterior through to the interior. This book highlights the ways in which classical theory and Renaissance practice intersected in quattrocento Florence. Using unpublished inventories, private documents and surviving domestic objects, The Renaissance Palace in Florence offers a more nuanced understanding of the early modern urban palace.

Churches and palaces in Florence have been the subject matter of book-length, often multi-volume studies over the centuries. This book is a compendium of the main churches in Florence and has been written with two distinct audiences in mind: English-speaking students of Renaissance art, architecture, literature and history and the well-read traveller to Florence who wishes to place the works of art and architecture into the wider context of Italian culture. The choice of churches discussed here was influenced by the author’s experience as teacher for several university programmes on site in Florence. The buildings described and analysed are those which students will most likely encounter in the course of their study-abroad stay in Florence, whether they wish to specialise in art, architecture or the history of the Florentine Renaissance. This book represents a textbook that offers concise information on the history, art, and architecture of 25 of the main Florentine churches, provides plans and photos of the façades, and introduces the student to some of the most important vocabulary and the main textual sources of the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries.