The Engraving Work of Giambattista Piranesi in Bassano del Grappa

Two floors with restored environments in one of the most beautiful palaces in Bassano del Grappa, seven exhibition rooms, fifty-six display cases, and almost all of the works engraved by Piranesi. This is Giambattista Piranesi. Timeless Architect, the exhibition curated by Chiara Casarin and Pierluigi Panza open to the public since June 21, 2020, set in the splendid setting of Palazzo Sturm, among the venues of the Civic Museums of Bassano del Grappa. An exhibition that pays tribute to the genius of Piranesi three hundred years after his birth (October 4, 1720).

The Contemporary on Display

Opening the exhibition and welcoming visitors in the first room of the exhibition path is Icons Unplugged. View of the Castle of Acqua Felice, the work of contemporary artist Luca Pignatelli that the curators wanted to showcase to demonstrate how the teachings of the ancients are alive and present in contemporary artistic research. Just as the massive King Kong Rhino in stainless steel by Li-Jen Shih – placed on the external Belvedere – dialogued until last January with the famous Rhinoceros and the graphic work of Albrecht Dürer (the protagonist of the previous exhibition), so Luca Pignatelli’s work now confronts the representation of time by Piranesi, placing it in current thought and enriching it with new messages.

Luca Pignatelli, “Icons Unplugged. View of the Castle of Acqua Felice”, 2020

Giambattista Piranesi, Timeless Architect

Designer, engraver, architect, and antiquarian, Giambattista Piranesi is today considered the greatest exponent of 18th-century Venetian engraving. Visionary, dreamlike yet at the same time concrete, his works have influenced the imagination and fantasies of many after him. His Views of Rome and the four volumes of Roman Antiquities – among his most famous collections, displayed in the cases on the fourth floor of the Palace – are still relevant in describing with meticulous and archaeological precision the city of Rome through its monuments, its areas, and its spaces as they appeared in the mid-18th century. The plates of the loose engravings and those enclosed in the displayed volumes testify to the incredible engraving technique of the artist of Venetian origins, characterized by both pictorial quality and architectural precision, to which is added the pre-romantic charm for ruin.

What makes this heritage even more extraordinary is its illustrious provenance: the volumes displayed at Palazzo Sturm were part of the very rich personal library of Antonio Canova, donated to the municipality of Bassano del Grappa by the sculptor’s adopted brother: Giambattista Sartori Canova. These were in turn included among the Fine Arts books of Prince Abbondio Rezzonico, nephew of Pope Clement XIII, who bequeathed them to his friend Canova upon his death.

The exhibition path that guides the visitor through the cases on the fourth floor is, in fact, a journey to discover the most beautiful monuments of ancient and modern Rome: from the view of the Bridge and Castel Sant’Angelo to the port of Ripa Grande, from the Pyramid of Caius Cestius to the Tomb of Santa Costanza, Piranesi faithfully and skillfully reproduces every single detail of those antiquities studied in detail, almost inviting us to take part in those groups of tiny figures bustling at their feet.

The Prisons from the Cini Foundation

But as you ascend the two flights of stairs leading to the fifth floor of Palazzo Sturm, the atmosphere and scenery change radically. The external views with their wide spaces and precise, defined graphic lines give way to closed and dark environments rendered with a nervous and marked stroke. These are the 16 plates of the Carceri d’Invenzione, Piranesi’s most famous work published in its definitive edition in 1761, with the engravings on display coming from the collection of the Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice.

To make the visit to discover the dark chambers, tunnels, bridges, and torture instruments present in the plates more ‘immersive’ is the animation video created by Grégoire Dupond for Factum Arte projected in the adjacent room, which reconstructs each environment in three dimensions. The exhibition is completed with other Piranesian material from the Bassano collections: some Remondini engravings from Piranesi’s drawings, 48 engravings by Francesco, Giambattista’s son, and the correspondence between the latter and Count Antonio Remondini of Bassano del Grappa.

All the works displayed at Palazzo Sturm are published in the scientific catalog of the exhibition, published by Silvana Editoriale, with texts by Chiara Casarin, Pierluigi Panza, Luca Massimo Barbero, Enzo Di Martino, Manlio Brusatin, and Stefano Pagliantini.

Giambattista Piranesi. Timeless Architect thus presents itself as a clear and complete exhibition of a corpus of extraordinary works brought together and displayed in full for the first time; a journey to discover the artistic genius of Piranesi, his origins, his family, and his works. An itinerary that guides from monumental Rome to the interior of the “black” and visionary mind of one of the most avant-garde artists of his time.

Visit in preview Palazzo Sturm and the exhibition “Giambattista Piranesi. Timeless Architect” on Artsupp!