Once in every generation comes a scholar who is a master of both the documentary evidence and the buildings themselves. Such a man is Christoph Luitpold Frommel who, after winning a world-wide reputation, here distils his learning into a new synthesis that is both up-to-date and securely based on primary sources.

The book is not only illustrated throughout with photographs, drawings, plans and reconstructions, but social context, technical innovation and aesthetic judgement are all given due weight, with particular emphasis on the way in which each architect balanced individual inspiration with the accepted canon.

Christoph Luitpold Frommel was born in 1933 and has held academic posts in Germany (Bonn University), the USA (Institute of Advanced Study, Princeton, and the University of California, Berkeley) and Italy (La Sapienza, Rome). He was Director of the Bibliotheca Herziana, Rome, from 1980 to 2001.

• A definitive account of the most innovative and most influential 150 years in the history of architecture
• A work that brings scholarship in English into line with the most advanced continental research
• Over 300 photographs, architects’ drawings and plans
• Authoritative, readable, deeply considered
• The fruit of a lifetime’s study

Данная книга приглашает вас перенестись в переломный период нашего культурного наследия. Эта эпоха сформировала наше коллективное сознание, и ее влияние мы ощущаем и по сей день - ее называют эпохой Возрождения - Ренессанса.

Именно в этот период на свет появился "современный человек", "современный" в новом эмпирическом и научном осознании себя как личности, "современный" в постепенном отходе от средневековых понятий о реальности.

Эта коллекция декоративных орнаментов характерна для духа Ренессанса, в эпоху которого проявилось превосходство орнаментального дизайна. Многие из этих орнаментов были внесены в краткие руководства, которые использовали художники в своей работе. В этих сборниках присутствовали лиственные орнаменты, плетеные орнаменты, перемежающиеся геометрическими линиями, и стилизованные растительные формы; арабески, которые пошли от арабских орнаментов, распространившихся в 15-м веке из Венеции по всей Европе; другие рисунки, используемые для создания скульптур, ювелирных украшений и мебели, украшались необычными существами, напоминающими людей и животных одновременно.

Аналогичные узоры использовались в таких разнообразных областях, как архитектура, живопись, кружевоплетение и текстиль.

Все иллюстрации в этой книге представлены на компакт-диске, которые могут использоваться как на PC, так и на Мас компьютерах. Изображения сохранены в файлах формата TIFF высокого разрешения.

From the renovation of ancient aqueducts in Rome to the computer-controlled jets that celebrated the dawn of the twenty-first century, Fountains, Splash and Spectacle traces the history of fountain design over the centuries and across nations, exploring the collaborations of architects, sculptors, garden and landscape designers, hydraulics experts and engineers.

Thematic examination of the aesthetics, social implications and purposes of fountains reveals a surprising diversity of functions these structures provide, from flamboyant public gesture to private oasis.

Over 300 illustrations – photographs, paintings, etchings and drawings – accompany the many fountains discussed and also include designs for fascinating unrealized projects. A comprehensive bibliography and chronology make this a valuable work of reference as well as a joy to the eye.

Art as we know it today could not exist had not the revolutionary work of the Renaissance artists paved the way. Widely considered the most important and influential movement in the history of fine arts, literature, architecture, and science, the Renaissance marked the emergence of Western civilization from the Middle Ages into the modern era. Beginning in the 14th century in Italy, the movement spread throughout Europe by the late 15th century, the main centers of fine art activity being in Florence, the Low Countries, and Germany. For the first time, art became intellectual; influenced by humanism, artists experimented with secular subjects and revived classical antiquity. Advances in anatomy and geometry produced more realistic depictions in terms of space and perspective for the Italians, while new oil painting techniques made their mark in Flemish painting and woodcuts and engravings were the specialties of the Germans.

Artists featured: Albrecht Altdorfer, Fra Angelico, Giovanni Bellini, Hieronymus Bosch, Sandro Botticelli, Pieter Breughel, Agnolo Bronzino, Vittore Carpaccio, François Clouet, Correggio, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Albrecht Dürer, El Greco, School of Fontainebleau, Piero della Francesca, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Giorgione, Matthias Grünewald, Maerten van Heemskerck, Hans Holbein the Younger, Fra Filippo Lippi, Lorenzo Lotto, Andrea Mantegna, Masaccio, Antonello da Messina, Michelangelo, Parmigianino, Pontormo, Raphael, Luca Signorelli, Tintoretto, Titian, Paolo Uccello, Veronese, Leonardo da Vinci

About the Series:
Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Genre Series features:

* a detailed introduction with approximately 35 photographs, plus a timeline of the most important events (political, cultural, scientific, etc.) that took place during the time period
* a selection of the most important works of the epoch; each is presented on a 2-page spread with a full-page image and, on the facing page, a description/interpretation of the work and brief biography of the artist as well as additional information such as a reference work, portrait of the artist, and/or citations

Text in Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish

With the Renaissance in the 15th and 16th centuries came a revival of interest in the classical arts of Ancient Greece and Rome. Although the sculpture and architectural ornamentation during the Renaissance tended to be complex, two-dimensional patterns were often more subdued.