How many of us, opening a history book to the chapter dedicated to the Renaissance, have come across the work we will discuss today? Alongside The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci, Ideal City is by definition the symbol, if not even the iconography, of the Italian Renaissance.
The Ideal City, Utopia of the Renaissance
The ideal city is a theme that runs through the Renaissance throughout its entire development. After the dark centuries of the Middle Ages, characterized by the overwhelming power of the church and the absolute belief that God was everything and man nothing, Renaissance culture places man and his rational actions at the center of its interests. Thus, the Renaissance man, freed from the heavy constraints of the Middle Ages, reaffirms himself as the architect of his own existence.
This renewed centrality of man also takes shape in the organization of urban spaces, rethinking the city in a unified and proportionate key. The ideal city of the Renaissance, governed by the absolute laws of geometry and proportion, is a true hymn to man and the centrality of his intellect.
Addressing the problem of adapting the existing city to new needs, in the first half of the fifteenth century, Leon Battista Alberti, architect, writer, mathematician, and humanist, codifies a new practice of architecture and urban planning. Starting from the study of antiquity and the measurement of ancient monuments, Alberti’s treatise lays the foundations for new types of modern buildings. Painters, in turn, adopt these indications, and in their paintings, Renaissance scenes, rich in classical references, are composed in an ideal harmony.
The Work of the Ducal Palace of Urbino
A striking example of this humanist conception is the work Ideal City, preserved at the National Gallery of the Marche in Urbino.
The painting represents the ideals of perfection and harmony of the Italian Renaissance, in the orderly and symmetrical form of a city depicted with the scientific principles of central perspective. In the foreground, on the sides, there are two wells with octagonal bases, placed in a perfectly symmetrical manner. Dominating the scene is a large religious building with a circular plan. A baptistery? A mausoleum? Who knows.
Enhancing the perspective vision are the facades of the noble Renaissance palaces that delimit the square. To the perfect geometric perspective, a similarly refined choice of colors is added: gray-blue buildings, others in orange hues. To increase the sensation of eternal peace and silence, there is the absolute absence of any human figure.
Carefully observing the work, one perceives how the indications of Leon Battista Alberti regarding architecture had also been assimilated by artists. In his treatise De re ædificatoria, Alberti identifies the stylistic elements of the classical repertoire to be revived: large arches reminiscent of triumphal ones, pillars, columns, wide domes; all elements that we find in the work preserved at the Ducal Palace of Urbino.
A Mysterious Work
A veil of mystery surrounds this work that we all know so well but of which, at the same time, we know so little. The author remains unknown, and it is only known that it was created between 1480 and 1490 in Urbino at the court of Federico da Montefeltro and that it most likely belonged to the ducal family. It is said that Elisabetta da Montefeltro, daughter of Federico, may have taken the painting with her when she entered the monastery after becoming a widow in 1482.
Its function also raises doubts and conjectures. Some say it was used as a wooden backrest for a piece of furniture, or even as a model for a set design.
Ideal City: The Other Versions
Did you know that there are two other versions of “View of the Ideal City”, one of which is preserved at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore attributed to the same author as the Urbino panel.
The other, different from the other two in style and colors, is preserved at the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin.
Before going to admire it in person at the Ducal Palace of Urbino, you can see all the details of the work in high definition on Artsupp Ideal City.
