Andrea Pozzo's Profile as a Master of Perspective

Abstract

The international impact of Andrea Pozzo (1642-1709) as an architect, painter, builder of ephemeral artifacts and quadraturista, was principally a result of the wide dissemination of his treatise Perspectiva Pictorum Architectorum (Rome 1693-1700). In these volumes, Pozzo offered a simplified method of his personal creation, in addition to the perspective models learned from Vignola, Pietro Accolti, and Jean Dubreuil, among other sources. His technique was devised to portray any architectural depiction in perspective solely through the use of graphic solutions and without any mathematical procedures. Andrea Pozzo's profile as a master of perspective was characterized by the merging of his intellectual and technical training acquired in the libraries of the Order, in conjunction to his experience as the head of a developed art studio and his significant artistic drive. This is in contrast to other contemporaneous publications, allegedly which are assumed to be similar in function and content (for example, L'architettura civile ridotta a' método facile e breve by F. Eschinardi). Pozzo's work is the last stage in the spread of perspective technique, disseminated through a teaching plan easily applicable to any field of architecture and painting, in which the optical-perceptual tradition and geometric-mathematical understandings converge.

Keywords:
Andrea Pozzo; perspective technique; Perspectiva Pictorum Architectorum