Rococo
Rococo, less commonly Roccoco, also known as Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and dramatic style of architecture, art, and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, and trompe-l'œil frescoes to create surprise and the illusion of motion and drama. It is often described as the final expression of the Baroque movement.
Originally known as the “style Rocaille," Rococo began in France in the 1730s as a reaction against the more formal and geometric Louis XIV style. It soon spread to other parts of Europe, particularly northern Italy, Austria, southern Germany, Central Europe and Russia. It also came to influence other arts, particularly sculpture, furniture, silverware, glassware, painting, music, theatre, and literature. Although originally a secular style primarily used for interiors of private residences, the Rococo had a spiritual aspect to it which led to its widespread use in church interiors, particularly in Central Europe, Portugal, and South America.
Etymology
The word rococo was first used as a humorous variation of the word rocaille by Pierre-Maurice Quays. Rocaille was originally a method of decoration utilizing pebbles, seashells, and cement, which from the Renaissance had often been used to decorate grottoes and fountains. In the late 17th and early 18th century, rocaille became the term for a decorative motif that appeared in the late Louis XIV style in the form of a seashell interlaced with acanthus leaves. In 1736, the designer and jeweler Jean Mondon published the Premier Livre de forme rocquaille et cartel, a collection of designs for ornaments of furniture and interior decoration. It was the first appearance in print of the term rocaille to designate the style. The carved or moulded seashell motif was combined with palm leaves or twisting vines to decorate doorways, furniture, wall panels, and other architectural elements.The term rococo was first used in print in 1825 to describe decoration which was "out of style and old-fashioned." It was used in 1828 for decoration "which belonged to the style of the 18th century, overloaded with twisting ornaments." In 1829, the author Stendhal described rococo as "the rocaille style of the 18th century."
File: Engelszell Stiftskirche - Nepomukaltar 4 Kapitell.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Capital of the Engelszell Abbey, from Austria
In the 19th century, the term was used to describe architecture or music which was excessively ornamental. Since the mid-19th century, the term has been accepted by art historians. While there is still some debate about the historical significance of the style, Rococo is now often considered a distinct period in the development of European art.
Characteristics
Rococo features exuberant decoration, with an abundance of curves, counter-curves, undulations, and elements modeled on nature. The exteriors of Rococo buildings are often simple, while the interiors are dominated by ornamentation. The style was highly theatrical, designed to create an impression of surprise, awe, and wonder on first view. Floor plans of churches were often complex, featuring interlocking ovals. In palaces, grand stairways became centrepieces, offering different viewpoints of the decoration. The main ornaments of Rococo include asymmetrical shells, acanthus and other leaves, birds, bouquets of flowers, fruit, musical instruments, angels, and Chinoiserie.The style often integrated moulded stucco, wood carving, and quadratura, or illusionist ceiling paintings, which were designed to give the impression that those entering the room were looking up at the sky, with cherubs and other figures gazing down at them. Materials used included stucco that had been either painted or left white, combinations of different coloured woods, lacquered wood in the Japanese style, gilded bronze, and marble.
Differences between Baroque and Rococo
Rococo tends to have the following characteristics, which Baroque does not:- partial abandonment of symmetry, everything being composed of graceful lines and curves, similar to Art Nouveau
- asymmetrical curves and C-shaped volutes
- ornamental flowers, e.g. floral festoons
- occasional use of East Asian motifs
- warm pastel colours
France
Furniture from the era also features the sinuous curves and vegetal designs characteristic of the style, especially in the complex frames made for mirrors and paintings, which were sculpted in plaster and often gilded. The leading furniture designers and craftsmen in the style included Juste-Aurele Meissonier, Charles Cressent, and Nicolas Pineau.
French Rococo never achieved the extravagance of the style seen in Bavaria, Austria, or Italy. Lasting until the mid-18th century, the discoveries of Roman antiquities at Herculaneum in 1738 and Pompeii in 1748 turned French architecture in the direction of the more symmetrical and less flamboyant neo-classicism.
Italy
Artists in Italy, particularly Venice, produced their own version of the Rococo style. Venetian commodes imitated the curving lines and carved ornaments of the French Rocaille, but with a particular Venetian variation; the pieces were painted—often with landscapes, flowers, scenes from Guardi or other painters, or Chinoiserie—against a blue or green background, matching the colours of the Venetian school of painters whose work decorated salons.Notable decorative painters included Giovanni Battista Crosato, who painted the ballroom ceiling of the Ca' Rezzonico in the quadraturo manner, and Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, who painted ceilings and murals in both churches and palazzos. Tiepolo travelled to Germany with his son from 1750 to 1753, decorating the ceilings of the Würzburg Residence, one of the major landmarks of Bavarian Rococo. Another celebrated Venetian painter was Giovanni Battista Piazzetta, who painted several notable church ceilings.
Venetian Rococo also featured exceptional glassware, particularly Murano glass, which was often engraved and coloured, and was exported across Europe. Works included multicolour chandeliers and mirrors with extremely ornate frames.
Southern Germany
The Rococo decorative style reached its summit in southern Germany and Austria from the 1730s until the 1770s. There it dominates the church landscape to this day and is deeply anchored in popular culture. It was first introduced from France through the publications and works of French architects and decorators, including sculptor Claude III Audran, interior designer Gilles-Marie Oppenordt, architect Germain Boffrand, sculptor Jean Mondon, and draftsman and engraver Pierre Lepautre. Their work had an important influence on the German Rococo style, but does not reach the extravagance of buildings in southern Germany.German architects adapted the Rococo style by making it far more asymmetrical and ornate than the original French. The German style was characterized by an explosion of forms that cascaded down the walls. It featured molding formed into curves and counter-curves, twisting and turning patterns, and stucco foliage which seemed to be creeping up the walls and across the ceiling. The decoration was often gilded or silvered to give it contrast with the white or pale pastel walls.
One of the first Rococo buildings in Germany, the pavilion of Amalienburg in Munich, was created by the Belgian-born architect and designer François de Cuvilliés, who was inspired by the pavilions of the Grand Trianon and the Château de Marly in France. It was built as a hunting lodge, with a platform on the roof for shooting pheasants. The interior Hall of Mirrors by painter and stucco sculptor Johann Baptist Zimmermann is far more elaborate than any French Rococo.
Another notable example of early German Rococo is the Würzburg Residence, commissioned by Prince-Bishop Johann Philipp Franz von Schönborn. Early in the palace's construction, court architect Balthasar Neumann travelled to Paris and consulted with the French rocaille decorative artists Germain Boffrand and Robert de Cotte. While the exterior of the palace is in the more sober Baroque style, the interior, particularly the stairways and ceilings, is much more extravagant. Neumann described the interior of the residence as "a theatre of light." From 1750–1753, the Italian Rococo painter Giovanni Battista Tiepolo was imported to create a mural over the top of the three-level ceremonial stairway. Neumann also designed the iconic Rococo stairway at Augustusburg Castle in Brühl, which leads visitors up through a fantasy of painting, sculpture, and ironwork, with surprising views at every turn.
In the 1740s and 1750s, a number of pilgrimage churches were constructed in Bavaria with interiors decorated in a distinctive variant of Rococo style. One of the most notable examples is the Wieskirche designed by Dominikus Zimmermann. Like most Bavarian pilgrimage churches, the exterior is very simple, with pastel walls and little ornament. Entering the church, the visitor encounters an astonishing harmony of art and form. The oval-shaped sanctuary, preceded to the west by a semicircular antechamber, fills the church with light from all sides. The white walls are contrasted with columns of blue and pink stucco in the choir, and the domed ceiling is painted in the appearance of an open sky, across which, angels fly. Other notable Bavarian pilgrimage churches include the Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers by Balthasar Neumann, and Ottobeuren Abbey by Johann Michael Fischer, which features, like much of German Rococo architecture, a remarkable contrast between the regularity of its facade and the overabundance of decoration in its interior.