Absolute masterpiece of the Renaissance art and evident example of the Italian ingenuity, the temple of Bramante is one of the most popular and admired works of the history of architecture.
One of the most spectacular and famous works by Gian Lorenzo Bernini is the “Ecstasy of Saint Teresa”. Sculpted between 1647 and 1652, it’s dedicated to Teresa of Avila, Spanish mystic and Carmelite nun who lived in 1500s and was canonized in 1622.
One of the greatest and more brilliant artists to ever lived– as we had already pointed out – was Gian Lorenzo Bernini. He was a sculptor, a painter and an architect of the XVII century who gave his best in the Eternal City with one of the most fruitful artistic production in the history of art.
One of the most famous sculptures of the Capitoline Museums is definitely the “Girl with a Dove”. The Capitoline Museums not only have the largest collection of classical sculptures in the world, but they are also considered the most ancient public exhibition space. Although they first opened to the public under the papacy of Clement XII, at the beginning of the 18th century, in 1734 to be exact (this is already a world record, just think about Louvre that opened only in 1793), the official birth of this institution is commonly dated back to 1471, year in which pope Sixtus IV donated the bronze statues of the Lateran to the city.
If we get in the splendid basilica of Sant’Agostino, Saint Augustine, a 15th century church near Piazza Navona, and look up to the third pilaster on the left of the nave, we can see, over the sculptural group of Andrea Sansovino (representing Saint Anne, the Virgin Mary and Jesus as a child), an amazing fresco by Raphael Sanzio. The artist from Urbino, one of the greatest painting geniuses, worked in this church, since an important prelate commissioned him a fresco with the prophet Isaiah as the protagonist.
Right behind the Pantheon there is the small Piazza della Minerva, in the centre of which solemnly rises the figure of a stocky and funny little elephant. The pachyderm, made of Carrara marble, holds on his strong back a pink granite obelisk, found in 1665 circa, in the garden of the close Dominican monastery. Almost 5.5 metres tall, this obelisk, from the 6th century B.C., once decorated the temple of the Egyptian goddess Isis, that during the Roman era was located in this area.
One of the greatest masterpieces of the history of art is the Moses by Michelangelo. Extraordinary work of the Renaissance, it is the most important sculpture in the tomb of Julius II, in the church of Saint Peter in Vincoli. It was sculpted by the Tuscan artist between 1513 and 1516, and it represents the central element of this amazing mausoleum that started to host the remains of the pontiff almost a century after his death, which took place February 21st, 1513.
The Laocoon group, known simply as the Laocoon, is one of the most famous sculptures in the world. Masterpiece of Ancient Roman art, probably carved in the second half of the 1st century BC, it is a marble copy of a Hellenistic bronze statue, likely produced by the school of Pergamon. Attributed to Agesander, Polydorus and Athenodorus, three very famous sculptors from Rhodes, it represents one of the most famous episodes from the Iliad, described in detail by Vergil in the Aeneid.
