Quadratura
Quadratura is a term introduced during the Baroque period to describe simulated architecture. This technique unites architecture, painting and sculpture, leading to an overwhelming impression of illusionism.
The artist would paint a feigned architecture in perspective on a flat or barrel-vaulted ceiling in such a way that it seems to continue the existing architecture. The perspective of this illusion is centered towards one focal point. The steep foreshortening of the figures, the painted walls and pillars, creates an illusion of deep recession, heavenly sphere or even an open sky.
Anamorphosis relates directly to quadratura. Paintings on ceilings could, for example, simulate statues in niches or openings revealing the sky.
Celebrated examples of this technique were produced by :
- Andrea Pozzo at San Ignazio in Rome and the Jesuit church in Vienna. He wrote the standard theoretical work of his artistic ideas in the two volumes of : Perspectiva pictorum et architectorum Andreae Putei a societate Jesu (Rome, 1693-1700).
- Pietro da Cortona at the Palazzo Barberini,
- Gianbattista Tiepolo in Ca'Rezzonico, Villa Pisani at Stra, and the throne room at the Royal Palace of Madrid.
Other examples were by Paolo Veronese at Villa Rotonda in Vicenza and Baldassare Peruzzi in the Villa Farnesina of Rome.