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Donato Bramante

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Donato Bramante
Born Donato di Pascuccio d'Antonio
1444
Fermignano, Duchy of Urbino (present-day Italy)
Died 11 April 1514 (aged 69–70)
Rome, Papal States (present-day Italy)
Known for Architecture
painting
Notable work San Pietro in Montorio
Movement High Renaissance

Donato Bramante[1] (1444 – 11 April 1514),[2] born as Donato di Pascuccio d'Antonio[3] and also known as Bramante Lazzari,[4][5] was an Italian architect and painter. He introduced Renaissance architecture to Milan and the High Renaissance style to Rome, where his plan for St. Peter's Basilica formed the basis of the design executed by Michelangelo. His Tempietto (San Pietro in Montorio) marked the beginning of the High Renaissance in Rome (1502) when Pope Julius II appointed him to build a sanctuary over the spot where Peter was martyred.

Life

Urbino

Bramante, born Donato d'Augnolo according to the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica,[5] was born at Fermignano near Urbino. Here, in 1467, Luciano Laurana was adding to the Palazzo Ducale an arcaded courtyard and other Renaissance features to Federico da Montefeltro's ducal palace. Bramante's architecture has eclipsed his painting skills: he knew the painters Melozzo da Forlì and Piero della Francesca well, who were interested in the rules of perspective and illusionistic features in Andrea Mantegna's painting.

Milan

Around 1474, Bramante moved to Milan, a city with a deep Gothic architectural tradition, and built several churches in the new Antique style. The Duke, Ludovico Sforza, made him virtually his court architect, beginning in 1476, with commissions that culminated in the famous trompe-l'œil choir of the church of Santa Maria presso San Satiro (1482–1486). Space was limited, and Bramante made a theatrical apse in bas-relief, combining the painterly arts of perspective with Roman details. There is an octagonal sacristy, surmounted by a dome. In Milan, Bramante also built the tribune of Santa Maria delle Grazie (1492–99); other early works include the Cloisters of Sant'Ambrogio, Milan (1497–1498), and some other constructions in Pavia (where he worked on the Cathedral, setting the design and creating the crypt and part of the apse[6]) and possibly Legnano. However, in 1499, with his Sforza patron driven from Milan by an invading French army, Bramante made his way to Rome, where he was already known to the powerful Cardinal Riario.

Rome

In Rome, he was soon recognised by Cardinal Della Rovere, shortly to become Pope Julius II. For Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile or possibly Julius II, Bramante designed one of the most harmonious buildings of the Renaissance: the Tempietto (1502) of San Pietro in Montorio on the Janiculum.[7] Despite its small scale, the construction has all the rigorous proportions and symmetry of Classical structures, surrounded by slender Doric columns, surmounted by a dome. According to a later engraving by Sebastiano Serlio, Bramante planned to set it within a colonnaded courtyard. In November 1503, Julius engaged Bramante for the construction of the grandest European architectural commission of the 16th century, the complete rebuilding of St Peter's Basilica. During this time, he created the plans for a vast outdoor courtyard connecting the surrounding buildings called, Cortile del Belvedere.[8] The cornerstone of the first of the great piers of the crossing was laid with ceremony on 17 April 1506. Very few drawings by Bramante survive, though some by his assistants do, demonstrating the extent of the team which had been assembled. Bramante's vision for St Peter's, a centralized Greek cross plan that symbolized sublime perfection for him and his generation (compare Santa Maria della Consolazione at Todi, influenced by Bramante's work) was fundamentally altered by the extension of the nave after his death in 1514. Bramante's plan envisaged four great chapels filling the corner spaces between the equal transepts, each one capped with a smaller dome surrounding the great dome over the crossing. So Bramante's original plan was very much more Romano-Byzantine in its forms than the basilica that was actually built. (See St Peter's Basilica for further details.)

Bramante also worked on several other commissions. Among his earliest works in Rome, before the Basilica's construction was underway, is the cloister (1500–1504) of Santa Maria della Pace near Piazza Navona.

Works

In addition to building, Bramante wrote about architecture and composed eighty sonnets.[9]

See also

Footnotes

Sources

11.^ Guagliumi Silvia. (2014) Donato Bramante. Pittore e sommo architetto in Lombardia e a Roma. L'uomo, le idee e l'opera.

Silvia Editrice ISBN 978-88-96036-63-1.

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

Donato Bramante — (Also called D'AGNOLO after his father Angelo)

Italian architect and painter, b. about 1444 at Monte Asdrualdo (hence, sometimes ASDRUALDINO); d. in Rome, 11 March, 1514. Nothing is known of his early youth. His early artistic development also, about which Vasari has made so many erroneous statements, is mostly a matter of conjecture. To-day, however, it seems fairly certain that Laurana, the architect of the ducal palace at Urbino, showed him the way to the impressive style of the High Renaissance. Bramante's artistic activity is divided into two periods of which the first was spent in Milan and the other in Rome. His work in Milan is characterized by a pronounced picturesque, decorative style. In Rome, on the other hand, we find a style which is more proper to the High Renaissance, exemplified in works that are, as far as possible, free from all external decoration, impressive by reason of their proportions, and recalling the antique by their grandeur and power. In 1476 Bramante became the court architect of Lodovico Sforza (Il Moro), having been in Milan, as has been abundantly shown, from 1474. At first he seems to have been engaged principally as a painter, following the vigorous manner of Mantegna and Melozzo da Forlí. It is true that only scanty remains of his work at this time have been found. Such are the recently discovered fresco fragments, transported from the Casa Prinetti to the Brera (single figures of warriors, philosophers, poets, and singers); the more poorly preserved decorative paintings of the Casa Fontana, and among panel pictures undoubtedly the Scourging of Christ (Badia Chiaravalle near Milan). Bartolomeo Suardi, called Bramantino [cf. Suida in Jahrbuch der Kunstsammlungen des allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses (1905), 1 sqq.], was his assistant and rather weak imitator in the field of painting, but not his teacher as was thought by Vassari (ed. Milanesi-Sansoni, IV, 175). If Bramante occasionally devoted himself to Gothic, as he unquestionably did in some designs for the Milan cathedral, he exhibits from the start an excellent style, which, as Stile Bramantesco, became typical for the Renaissance architecture of Lombardy. It is characterized by ambitious proportions, internal concentration, a greater organic relation of parts, and by rich and fresh decorative forms.

His first great achievement in this line is the choir of the church of Santa Maria presso S. Satiro, begun in 1476. The choir has a flat end and a false apse, rendered in relieved perspective. The adjoining sacristy, octagonal in plan and surmounted by a dome, is charming on account of the richness of the interior articulation and most effective space-development. Its two interior stories are separated by a splendid terra-cotta frieze overlaid with bronze. The church came to have the same significance in Northern Italy as the Pazzi Chapel or the Sacristy of Santo Spirito in Florence. Still richer in ornament are the transept and choir of Santa Maria delle Grazie (1492-99), by which the superiority of the imposing new style over the Gothic can best be shown. In addition to these great churches, the Canonica, or canons' residence, of San Ambrogio (1492, only half completed) and the remodelled court of the Ospedale Maggiore are the only examples of Bramante's genius in Milan. A further development of this somewhat more decorative style to the larger, simpler proportions of the Roman period is suggested by the church of the Barnabites, Santa Maria di Capenuova in Pavia (1492), and also by the churches of Busto Arsizio and Santa Maria in Legnano. The magnificent articulation of the façade of Abbiategrasso shows in full development the powerful boldness of the Roman style whose growth, in Rome, was influenced not only by the antique, but also by the use of a more intractable material (travertine) which made small, detail treatment an impossibility. The date of this church is probably 1497 instead of 1477, as Geymüller read it. Other ecclesiastical structures of Lombardy upon which the influence or imitation of Bramante is perceptible, are the Cathedral of Como (south portal), the Pilgrimage Church at Cremona, and the Incoronata at Lodi.

Even greater is the number of structures indirectly influenced by Bramante in Northern and Middle Italy after the downfall of the Sforza in Milan (1499). Bramante at the end of the same year moved to Rome where he found in Alexander VI and still more in Julius II magnanimous patrons. Here, too, very little is known of his early work. It is still disputed whether or not the cloister of Santa Maria della Pace and the façade of the Church of the Anima can be ascribed to him. This is also true of the immense palace of Cardinal Raffaello Riario (the present Cancelleria) with the adjoining church of San Lorenzo in Damaso. On account of the inscribed dates (1489 and 1495) Gnoli ascribes them not to Bramante but to a Tuscan master, whereas Geymüller more correctly persists in ascribing them to Bramante, basing his view on considerations of style and on Bramante's relation with the Sforzas and the Riarios; this would also explain Bramante's working in Rome prior to 1492 [cf. Gnoli in Arch. stor. dell' arte (1892), IV, 176 sqq.; Riv. d'Italia (1898); and Geymüller in Rassegna d'arte (October and December, 1901), I]. The Palace Giraud Torlonia is a structure similar to the Cancellaria in its beautiful rhythmic articulation, its simplicity, and its monumental character. Undoubtedly Bramante is the designer of the pretty little circular temple in the court of San Pietro in Montorio (completed in 1502). It is planned quite after the manner of an antique temple and is the first structure consciously designed and executed in the classic spirit, embodying the purest and simplest forms and the most agreeable proportions. A peristyle, never carried out, was intended to complete the building. Other works of Bramante's first Roman period are the choir of Santa Maria del Popolo, the plan for the reconstruction of the Vatican, the extension of the Belvedere court, etc. The most majestic creation, not only of Bramante and of the High Renaissance, but in fact of Christian art, is the new St. Peter's. According to Vasari, this was intended originally to enclose the magnificent tomb of Julius II, begun by Michaelangelo. But on account of the hopelessly ruinous condition of the old St. Peter's, its rebuilding became an immediate necessity and, indeed, was determined upon shortly after the accession of Julius II, probably in connexion with the reconstruction of the Vatican. As early as 18 April, 1506, the cornerstone of the pier of St. Helena was laid, and a year later those of the other three piers at the transept were in position. The ways and means employed by Bramante in dealing with the old building brought him many reproaches for his lack of sentiment, and earned for him the nickname of Ruinante. Nevertheless, the incomparable significance of this creation must not be overlooked because of such romantic sentiments, nor must it be forgotten that the pope had Bramante's plan carried out in spite of all remonstrances and of the enormous cost.

The artistic aims of the structure, or more especially of the original plans, are revealed by the numerous drawings, executed partly by the master himself, and partly by his assistants. Their critical examination and æsthetic appreciation are among Geymüller's chief achievements. According to him this brilliant plan passed through three stages: in the first, only a small chapel for the tomb of Julius II was contemplated; in the second, the continuation of the erection of the new buildings undertaken during the reigns of Nicholas V and Paul II; only in the third stage was an entirely independent new building decided upon. For it Bramante had in view, from the first, a building of centralized plan, more particularly the plan of a Greek cross. In this he saw the architectonic ideal which combined the greatest harmony, the most serviceable space-relations, as well as a tendency to the monumentally sublime. It was only as an alternative, so far as can be judged from extant sketches, that the master seems to have reserved for himself the possibility of using the Latin cross, being evidently compelled to make concessions to the liturgical needs of the Church. According to the oldest drawings and a memorial medal of Caradosos, dated 1506, the original ground plan was a pure Greek cross, the termination of whose arms was apsidal on the interior, rectangular on the exterior. An immense dome was carried over the crossing. The predominant form of the interior was rotunda- like. For the four corners immense chapels were planned, which again repeated the Greek cross; they were crowned by smaller domes, and each was flanked on the exterior by a tower. Between the apses of the cross-arms and these corner-towers lay large vestibules for the chapels of the flanking domes. In a second design the cross-arms are rounded and enclosed by immense ambulatory halls. The main dome is encircled by an arcaded colonnade. The piers of the domes were enriched by niches emphasizing the dominant idea of the interior. In Milan, San Lorenzo, a church of centralized plan (see ), evidently served as a model for this design. The principal ideas, however, were taken from the Pantheon and the Temple of Peace. The master was permitted to see only the initial steps towards the execution of his plan. He was able, nevertheless, to establish firmly its main lines for the architects who followed, inasmuch as the dome-supports with their arches, the southern transept, and the side domes were carried out under his direction. After his death in 1514 the continuation of the work was entrusted to the aged Fra Giocondo, and soon after (on a recommendation made by Bramante during his lifetime) to Raphael. Later on, San Gallo and Peruzzi were placed in charge. Bramante's plans suffered many changes and encroachments under the various directors until Michaelangelo returned to the fundamental ideas of the brilliant creator, and by the completion of the dome substantially carried the work to a conclusion. The curvature of the dome is not quite as bold and effective as that planned by Bramante; on the other hand it offers in its greater rise, a much more elegant and vigorous silhouette.

Under Julius II the influence of Bramante was predominant. Not only were the most daring works of architecture entrusted to him, but all other important building operations, and, in general, all artistic undertakings depended on his initiative and approbation, as the painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and of the loggie and the stanze, or halls, of the Vatican. In this way Raphael, his younger townsman, received the greatest possible aid and favour, whilst Bramante's intrigues against Michaelangelo were positively spiteful according to Vasari. Through envy of Michaelangelo's mighty genius, he assigned to this great master only unsuitable and unpleasant commissions. Though these tragically strained relations between the two great artists at the court of the Rovere pope seem to be a psychological puzzle, the key is to be found in the hard and self-torturing character of the Florentine. Bramante, on the contrary, was a man who enjoyed life in a happy and liberal way, and who knew how to live up to the dignity of his prominent position. The manifold character of his interests and activities is yet visible in his poems which have come down to us. With Michaelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo, he is one of the great intellects of the High Renaissance; he resembles them also in the fact that only a small part of his plans was completed.

PUNGILEONI, Memorie interno alla vita di Bramante (Rome, 1836); VON GEYMÜLLER, Les projets primitifs de la basilique de S. Pierre (Paris, 1875); SEMPER in DORME, Kunst u. Künstler (Leipzig, 1879), III, nos. 56-57; RICCI, Gli affreschi di Bramante (Milan, 1902); CAROTTI, Leonardo, Bramante, e Raffaello (Milan, 1905).

References

  1. Back to citation UK: /bræˈmænteɪ/ bram-AN-tay, "Bramante, Donato". Lexico UK English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Archived from the original on 24 October 2020. US: /brəˈmɑːnteɪ, -ti/ brə-MAHN-tay, -tee; "Bramante". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (5th ed.). HarperCollins. Retrieved 13 August 2019. "Bramante". Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. Merriam-Webster. OCLC 1032680871. Retrieved 13 August 2019. Italian: [doˈnaːto braˈmante].
  2. Back to citation Davies, Paul; Hemsoll, David (1996). "Bramante, Donato". In Turner, Jane (ed.). The Dictionary of Art. Vol. IV. New York: Grove. pp. 642–653. ISBN 1-884446-00-0.
  3. Back to citation Forsyth, Joseph (2001). Remarks on Antiquities, Arts, and Letters During an Excursion in Italy, in the Years 1802 and 1803. University of Delaware Press. p. 289.
  4. Back to citation Baynes, T. S., ed. (1878), "Bramante", Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 4 (9th ed.), New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, pp. 213–14
  5. Back to citation occurrence 5.0 Back to citation occurrence 5.1 Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911), "Bramante", Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 4 (11th ed.), Cambridge University Press, p. 418
  6. Back to citation "Duomo di Pavia". Lombardia Beni Culturali. Retrieved 30 July 2022.
  7. Back to citation Freiberg, Jack (2014). Bramante's Tempietto, the Roman Renaissance, and the Spanish Crown. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-04297-1.
  8. Back to citation Zuffi, Stefano; Hyams, Jay; Seppi, Giorgio; Pauli, Tatjana; Scardoni, Sergio (2003). The Renaissance: 1401-1610: the splendor of European art. New York: Barnes & Noble Books. ISBN 978-0-7607-4200-6. OCLC 53441832.
  9. Back to citation Weigert, Hans (1961). Busch, Harald; Lohse, Bernd (eds.). Buildings of Europe: Renaissance Europe. New York: The Macmillan Company. p. ix.
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