Gardens of Bomarzo | |
---|---|
Sacred Grove | |
Sacro Bosco | |
Location | Bomarzo, Italy |
Coordinates | 42°29′29.88″N12°14′51.27″E / 42.4916333°N 12.2475750°E |
Created | 16th century |
Designer | Pirro Ligorio |
The Sacro Bosco ("Sacred Grove"), [1] colloquially called Park of the Monsters (Parco dei Mostri in Italian), also named Garden of Bomarzo, is a Mannerist monumental complex located in Bomarzo, in the province of Viterbo, in northern Lazio, Italy. [2]
The garden was created during the 16th century. [3] The design is attributed to Pirro Ligorio, and the sculptures to Simone Moschino. Situated in a wooded valley bottom beneath the castle of Orsini, it is populated by grotesque sculptures and small buildings located among the natural vegetation.
The park's name stems from the many larger-than-life sculptures, some sculpted in the bedrock, which populate this predominantly barren landscape. It was commissioned by Pier Francesco Orsini, called Vicino, a 16th-century condottiero, and patron of the arts, greatly devoted to his wife Giulia Farnese (not to be confused with her maternal great-aunt Giulia Farnese, the mistress of Pope Alexander VI). When Orsini's wife died, he had the gardens constructed to cope with his grief.
During the 19th century, and deep into the 20th, the garden became overgrown and neglected, but after the Spanish painter Salvador Dalí made a short movie about the park and completed a painting actually based on the park in the 1950s, the Bettini family implemented a restoration program which lasted throughout the 1970s. Today, the garden, which remains private property, is a major tourist attraction.
The park of Bomarzo was intended not to please, but to astonish, and like many Mannerist works of art, its symbolism is arcane: examples are a large sculpture of one of Hannibal's war elephants, which mangles a Roman legionary, or the statue of Ceres lounging on the bare ground, with a vase of verdure perched on her head.
The many monstrous statues appear to be unconnected to any rational plan, and appear to have been strewn almost randomly about the area, sol per sfogare il Core ("just to set the heart free") as one inscription in the obelisks says.
Allusive verses in Italian by Annibal Caro (the first one is of him, in 1564), Bitussi, and Cristoforo Madruzzo, some of them now eroded, were inscribed beside the sculptures.
The reason for the layout and design of the garden is largely unknown; Liane Lefaivre thinks they are illustrations of the romance novel Hypnerotomachia Poliphili . [4] Perhaps they were meant as a foil to the perfect symmetry and layout of the great Renaissance gardens nearby at Villa Farnese, and Villa Lante. Next to a formal exit gate is a tilting watchtower-like casina, the so-called Casa Pendente ("Leaning House").
The House of Orsini is an Italian noble family that was one of the most influential princely families in medieval Italy and Renaissance Rome. Members of the Orsini family include five popes: Stephen II (752–757), Paul I (757–767), Celestine III (1191–1198), Nicholas III (1277–1280), and Benedict XIII (1724–1730). In addition, the family included 34 cardinals, numerous condottieri, and other significant political and religious figures.
Bomarzo is a town and comune of the province of Viterbo, in the lower valley of the Tiber. It is located 14.5 kilometres (9.0 mi) east-northeast of Viterbo and 68 kilometres (42 mi) north-northwest of Rome.
The Villa Farnese, also known as Villa Caprarola, is a pentagonal mansion in the town of Caprarola in the province of Viterbo, Northern Lazio, Italy, approximately 50 kilometres (31 mi) north-west of Rome. This villa should not be confused with the Palazzo Farnese and the Villa Farnesina, both in Rome. A property of the Republic of Italy, Villa Farnese is run by the Polo Museale del Lazio.
GiacomoBarozzida Vignola, often simply called Vignola, was one of the great Italian architects of 16th century Mannerism. His two great masterpieces are the Villa Farnese at Caprarola and the Jesuits' Church of the Gesù in Rome. The three architects who spread the Italian Renaissance style throughout Western Europe are Vignola, Serlio and Palladio. He is often considered the most important architect in Rome in the Mannerist era.
The Villa Farnesina is a Renaissance suburban villa in the Via della Lungara, in the district of Trastevere in Rome, central Italy. Built between 1506 and 1510 for Agostino Chigi, the Pope's wealthy Sienese banker, it was a novel type of suburban villa, subsidiary to his main Palazzo Chigi in the city. It is especially famous for the rich frescos by Raphael and other High Renaissance artists that remain in situ.
Pier Francesco Orsini, also called Vicino Orsini, was an Italian condottiero, patron of the arts, and duke of Bomarzo. He is famous as the commissioner of the Mannerist Park of the Monsters in Bomarzo.
Giacomo Del Duca was an Italian sculptor and architect during the late-Renaissance or Mannerist period. He is most remembered for assisting Michelangelo in a number of projects in Rome, including the sculpture and construction of the tomb of Pope Julius II, completed in a highly truncated state relative to the original design, in San Pietro in Vincoli. He also modified Michelangelo's plans for buildings in the Capitoline Hill, one of the most famous and highest of the seven hills of Rome.
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The Italian Renaissance garden was a new style of garden which emerged in the late 15th century at villas in Rome and Florence, inspired by classical ideals of order and beauty, and intended for the pleasure of the view of the garden and the landscape beyond, for contemplation, and for the enjoyment of the sights, sounds and smells of the garden itself.
Italian garden typically refers to a style of gardens, wherever located, reflecting a number of large Italian Renaissance gardens which have survived in something like their original form. In the history of gardening, during the Renaissance, Italy had the most advanced and admired gardens in Europe, which greatly influenced other countries, especially the French formal garden and Dutch gardens and, mostly through these, gardens in Britain.
The classical sculptures in the Farnese Collection, one aspect of this large art collection, are one of the first collections of artistic items from Greco-Roman antiquity. It includes some of the most influential classical works, including the sculptures that were part of the Farnese Marbles, their collection of statuary, which includes world-famous works like the Farnese Hercules, Farnese Cup, Farnese Bull and the Farnese Atlas. These statues are now displayed in the Naples National Archaeological Museum in Italy with some in the British Museum in London.
Sacred grove or similar may mean:
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Rome:
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Simone Moschino was an Italian Renaissance sculptor and architect, born in Orvieto as Simone Simoncelli.
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A Renaissance garden is a garden or park created in the era and style of the Renaissance. Because the first such gardens originated in Italy, they are sometimes called Italian gardens. However, gardens made later in Germany, France, or England might have had some differences compared to the original Italian gardens.