Francesco Borromini

Francesco Castelli
Borromini (anonymous youth portrait)
Born	(1599-09-25)25 September 1599 Bissone
Died	3 August 1667(1667-08-03) (aged 67) Rome
Nationality	Swiss / Italian
Occupation	Architect
Practice	Francesco Borromini
Buildings	San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Sant'Agnese in Agone, Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, Oratorio dei Filippini

Francesco Borromini, byname of Francesco Castelli (25 September 1599 – 3 August 1667) was an architect from Ticino who, with his contemporaries, Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Pietro da Cortona, was a leading figure in the emergence of Roman Baroque architecture.

A keen student of the architecture of Michelangelo and the ruins of Antiquity, Borromini developed an inventive and distinctive, if somewhat idiosyncratic, architecture employing manipulations of Classical architectural forms, geometrical rationales in his plans and symbolic meanings in his buildings. He seems to have had a sound understanding of structures, which perhaps Bernini and Cortona, who were principally trained in other areas of the visual arts, lacked. His soft lead drawings are particularly distinctive. He appears to have been a self-taught scholar, amassing a large library by the end of his life.

His career was constrained by his personality. Unlike Bernini who easily adopted the mantle of the charming courtier in his pursuit of important commissions, Borromini was both melancholic and quick in temper which resulted in him withdrawing from certain jobs, and his death was by suicide.

Probably because his work was idiosyncratic, his subsequent influence was not widespread but is apparent in the Piedmontese works of Camillo-Guarino Guarini and, as a fusion with the architectural modes of Bernini and Cortona, in the late Baroque architecture of Northern Europe. Later critics of the Baroque, such as Francesco Milizia and the English architect Sir John Soane, were particularly critical of Borromini’s work. From the late nineteenth century onwards, interest has revived in the works of Borromini and his architecture has become appreciated for its inventiveness.

Early life and first works

Borromini was born at Bissone, near Lugano in the Ticino, which was at the time a bailiwick of the Old Swiss Confederacy. He was the son of a stone mason and began his career as a stone mason himself. He soon went to Milan to study and practice his craft. He moved to Rome in 1619 and started working for Carlo Maderno, his distant relative, at St. Peter's and then also at the Palazzo Barberini. When Maderno died in 1629, he and Pietro da Cortona continued to work on the palace under the direction of Bernini. Once he had become established in Rome, he changed his name from Castelli to Borromini, a name deriving from his mother's family and perhaps also out of regard for St Charles Borromeo

Major works

San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane (San Carlino)

Main article: San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane

Façade of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane.

In 1634, Borromini received his first major independent commission to design the church, cloister and monastic buildings of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane (also known as San Carlino). Situated on the Quirinal Hill in Rome, the complex was designed for the Discalced Carmelites, a religious order. The monastic buildings and the cloister were completed first after which construction of the church took place during the period 1638-1641 and in 1646 it was dedicated to San Carlo Borromeo. The church is considered by many to be an exemplary masterpiece of Roman Baroque architecture. San Carlino is remarkably small given its significance to Baroque architecture; it has been noted that the whole building would fit into one of the dome piers of Saint Peter's.

The site was not an easy one; it was a corner site and the space was limited. Borromini positioned the church on the corner of two intersecting roads. Although the idea for the serpentine facade must have been conceived fairly early on, probably in the mid 1630's, it was only constructed towards the end of Borromini's life and the upper part was not completed until after the architect's death.

Borromini devised the complex ground plan of the church from interlocking geometrical configurations, a typical Borromini device for constructing plans. The resulting effect is that the interior lower walls appear to weave in and out, partly alluding to a cross form, partly to a hexagonal form and partly to an oval form; geometrical figures that are all found explicitly in the dome above. The area of the pendentives marks the transition from the lower wall order to the oval opening of the dome. Illuminated by windows hidden from a viewer below, interlocking octagons, crosses and hexagons diminish in size as the dome rises to a lantern with the symbol of the Trinity.

Sant'Agnese in Agone

For Sant'Agnese in Agone, he reverted the original plan of Girolamo Rainaldi (and his son Carlo Rainaldi), which previously had its main entrance on Via di Santa Maria dell'Anima. The façade was expanded to include parts of the bordering Palazzo Pamphilj, gaining space for the two bell towers (each of which has a clock, as in St. Peter's, one for Roman time, the other for tempo ultramontano, European time).

Borromini lost this commission before completion due to the death of the Pope Innocent X in 1655. The new Pope, Alexander VII, and Prince Camillo Pamphilj recalled Rainaldi, but this one did not change very much and the church is mainly considered a notable expression of Borromini's concepts.

Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, courtyard and façade.

Sant' Ivo alla Sapienza

From 1640-1650, he worked on the design of the church of Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza and its courtyard, near University of Rome La Sapienza palace. It was initially the church of the Roman Archiginnasio. He had been initially recommended for the commission in 1632, by his then supervisor for the work at the Palazzo Barberini, Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The site, like many in cramped Rome, is challenged for external perspectives. It was built at the end of Giacomo della Porta's long courtyard. The dome and cochlear steeple are peculiar, and reflect the idiosyncratic architectural motifs that distinguish Borromini from contemporaries. Inside, the nave has an unusual centralized plan circled by alternating concave and convex-ending cornices, leading to a dome decorated with linear arrays of stars and putti. The geometry of the structure is a symmetric six-pointed star; from the center of the floor, the cornice looks like a two equilateral triangles forming a hexagon, but three of the points are clover-like, while the other three are concavely clipped. The innermost columns are points on a circle. The fusion of feverish and dynamic baroque excesses with a rationalistic geometry is an excellent match for a church in a papal institution of higher learning.

Oratory of Saint Phillip Neri (Oratorio dei Fillipini)

Main article: Oratorio dei Filippini

Oratory of Saint Phillip Neri

In the late sixteenth century, the Congregation of the Filippini (also known as the Oratorians) rebuilt the church of Santa Maria in Vallicella (known as the Chiesa Nuova -new church) in central Rome. In the 1620's, on a site adjacent to the church, the Fathers commissioned designs for their own residence and for an oratory (or oratorio in Italian) in which to hold their spiritual exercises. These exercises combined preaching and music in a form which became immensely popular and highly influential on the development of the musical oratorio.

The architect Paolo Maruscelli organised the general layout of the site and in 1637, Borromini was appointed as architect, possibly as the result of a competition. He was employed in the task for thirteen years. By 1640, the oratory was in use and by 1643, the library was complete. The striking brick curved facade adjacent to the church entrance has an unusual pediment and does not entirely correspond to the oratory room behind it. The white oratory interior has a ribbed vault and a complex wall arrangement of engaged pilasters along with freestanding columns supporting first level balconies. The altar wall was substantially reworked at a later date.

Borromini’s relations with the Oratorians were often fraught; there were heated arguments over the design and the selection of building materials. By 1650, the situation came to a head and in 1652 the Oratorians appointed another architect.

However, with the help of his Oratorian friend Virgilio Spada, Borromini documented his own account of the building of the oratory and the residence and an illustrated version was published in Italian in 1725

Other works

Borromini's works include:

• Interior of Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano
• Cappella Spada, San Girolamo della Carità (uncertain attribution)
• Palazzo Spada (trick perspective)
• Palazzo Barberini (upper-level windows and oval staircase)
• Santi Apostoli in Naples - Filamarino Altar
• Sant'Andrea delle Fratte
• Oratorio dei Filippini
• Collegio de Propaganda Fide
• Santa Maria dei Sette Dolori
• San Giovanni in Oleo (restoration)
• Palazzo Giustiniani (with Carlo Fontana)
• Facade of Palazzo Falconieri
• Santa Lucia in Selci (restoration)
• Saint Peter's Basilica (gates to Blessed Sacrament Chapel and possibly parts of baldacchino)

Death and epitaph

In the summer of 1667, and following completion of the Falconieri chapel (the High Altar chapel) in San Giovanni dei Fiorentini, Borromini committed suicide in Rome. possibly as a result of nervous disorders and depression,

In his testament, Borromini wrote that he did not want any name on his burial and expressed the desire to be buried in the tomb of his kinsman Carlo Maderno in San Giovanni dei Fiorentini. In recent times, his name was added on the marble plaque below the tomb of Maderno and a commemorative plaque was placed on a pillar of the church. This Latin inscription reads:

FRANCISCVS BORROMINI TICINENSIS
EQVES CHRISTI
QVI
IMPERITVRAE MEMORIAE ARCHITECTVS
DIVINAM ARTIS SVAE VIM
AD ROMAM MAGNIFICIS AEDIFICIIS EXORNANDAM VERTIT
IN QVIBUS
ORATORIVM PHILLIPINVM S. IVO S. AGNES IN AGONE
INSTAVRATA LATERANENSIS ARCHIBASILICA
S. ANDREAS DELLE FRATTE NVNCVPATUM
S. CAROLVS IN QVIRINALI
AEDES DE PROPADANDA FIDE
HOC AVTEM IPSVM TEMPLVM
ARA MAXIMA DECORAVIT
NON LONGE AB HOC LAPIDE
PROPE MORTALES CAROLI MADERNI EXUVVIAS
PROPINQVI MVNICIPIS ET AEMVLI SVI
IN PACE DOMINI QVIESCIT

Trivia

Borromini on a 100 francs note

Francesco Borromini was featured on the 100 Swiss Franc banknote current in the 1980s.

External links

• Columbia University: Joseph Connors, Francesco Borromini: Opus Architectonicum, Milan, 1998: Introduction to Borromini's own description of the Casa dei Filippini
• Borromini's own account of his eventually successful suicide attempt
• Marvin Trachtenberg and Isabelle Hyman. Architecture: from Prehistory to Post-Modernism. pp. 346–7.