Traveler's Guide to Art & Architecture: Architecture

Baroque

1650-1750--England's greatest architect was Christopher Wren (1632-1723), a scientist and member of Parliament who got the job of rebuilding London after the Great Fire of 1666. He designed 53 replacement churches alone, plus the new St. Paul's Cathedral and numerous other projects. Other proponents of baroque architecture were John Vanbrugh (1664-1726) and his mentor and oft collaborator, Nicholas Hawksmoor (1661-1736), who sometimes worked in a more Palladian idiom. Identifiable Features Classical architecture rewritten with curves. The baroque is similar to the Renaissance, but many of the right angles and ruler-straight lines are exchanged for curves of complex geometry and an interplay of concave and convex surfaces. The overall effect is to lighten the appearance of structures and to add some movement of line. Complex decoration. Unlike the sometimes severe designs of the Renaissance and other classically inspired styles, the baroque was often playful and apt to festoon structures with decorations intended to liven things up. Best Examples St. Paul's Cathedral, London (1676-1710). This cathedral is the crowning achievement of both English baroque and of Christopher Wren himself. London's other main Wren attraction is the Royal Naval College, Greenwich (1696). Queen's College, Sheldonian Theatre, and Radcliffe Camera, Oxford. Queen's College is the only campus of Oxford constructed entirely in one style, and it includes a library by Hawksmoor. The Sheldonian Theatre (1664-69), an almost classically subdued rotunda showing little of later baroque exuberance, was Wren's first crack at architecture. Compare this to the more baroque Radcliffe Camera (1737-49), designed by James Gibbs (1662-1754) who influenced Thomas Jefferson. Blenheim Palace, Woodstock (early 1700s). John Vanbrugh's crowning achievement, Blenheim Palace is a British Versailles surrounded by perhaps the best of Capability Brown's gardens. Castle Howard, Yorkshire (1699-1726). Another masterpiece by the team of Nicholas Hawksmoor and then-neophyte John Vanbrugh, Castle Howard became famous as a backdrop to Brideshead Revisited.

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