Esther M. Zimmer Lederberg
Vitruvius: Figure in a Circle, in a Square

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Vitruvius Figure, Circle, Square
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Renaissance artists and theoreticians such as Palladio, Alberti and Giorgi attempted to link art with philosophy, including rhetoric. Palladio introduced the use of classical orders from ancient Greece and ancient Rome. Alberti's theory of architecture was based on dimensions that created musical harmony and the physical proportions found in god's greatest creation: man (see the Vitruvian man). "The 'problem' of squaring the circle, that is, changing a circle into a square, had occupied mathematicians since the time of Pythagoras. The circle, with no beginning or end, symbolized perfection and deity, and the square symbolized the physical world (the square was traditionally a symbol of earth, the triangle a symbol of fire). 1 Therefore, the 'problem' of squaring the circle was a problem of how to change the divine into earthly material." 2 However, not everone agreed with Alberti's views concerning architecture. Two examples of architecture that could be in close proximity: one building of a pagan (ancient Greek) temple in purposeful disrepair in a rustic setting, but nearby, a church, with garden carefully maintained, the church in perfect condition. The stark difference was to show the victory of Christianity over the pagan religion.

As time passed, another major viewpoint emerged, especially during the Baroque, that was based on the views of the rhetorician Longinus in his book, "Peri Hypsous" ("On The Sublime"). This new viewpoint allowed for the unity or combination of divergent "styles"(for example, the architectural styles of the Renaissance, the Baroque, the Gothic, unities of "male" with "female": harmony with deliberate disharmony), to create an aesthetic of fear, horror and excess: a radical destruction of assumptions. Thus it should not be surprising that different parts of a building might strongly clash or appear discordant with each other.

1 "Dance and the Garden: Moving and Static Choreography in Renaissance Europe", by Jennifer Nevile, Renaissance Quarterly, vol. 52, 1999, p. 823
2 "The Eloquent Body: Dance and Humanist Culture in Fifteenth-Century Italy", by Jennifer Nevile, Indiana Univ. Press, 2004, p. 219, footnote 27.

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