| Elizabethan Baroque | |
|---|---|
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| Years active | 18th century |
| Location | Russian Empire Duchy of Courland |
Elizabethan Baroque (Russian:Елизаветинское барокко,romanized: Yelizavetinskoye barokko orElizavetinskoe barokko) is a term for theRussian Baroquearchitectural style, developed during the reign ofElizabeth of Russia between 1741 and 1762. It is also called styleRocaille orRococo style.[1] The Italian architectFrancesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli is the key figure of this trend, which is still given the name 'Rastrellian Baroque'. The Russian architectSavva Chevakinsky is also a renowned figure representing this style.[2]
Unlike the former Russian Baroque styles such asPetrine Baroque, the Elizabethan Baroque tended to appreciate theMuscovite Baroque, and maintained the very essence of Russian architectural elements like the five cupolas shaped likeonions.
The Elizabethan Baroque tended to create the architecture of grandeur in order to glorify the might of the Russian Empire. Rastrelli designed majestic palace complexes inSaint Petersburg and its environs: theWinter Palace, theCatherine Palace, and thePeterhof Palace. These palaces are characterized by gigantic proportions, golden splendour decorations, the use of two or three shades of colour for their façades, the refinement added by their gilding, give these buildings a particular style. The festive character of Rastrelli's work left its mark on all theRussian architecture of the middle of the eighteenth century. His most spectacular work is theSmolny Convent in St. Petersburg, the model he had made demonstrates the ambition of the original project that was not completed: the immense pyramidal steeple was never built.[3]
Rastrelli was influenced by the French architectsGermain Boffrand andRobert de Cotte; the great architects of Central Europe, fromBalthasar Neumann (Würzburg) toFrançois de Cuvilliés (Munich), fromMatthäus Daniel Pöppelmann (Dresden) toFischer von Erlach (Vienna,Salzburg); the monasteries in Moscow; not to mention the reminiscences ofGian Lorenzo Bernini andItalian Baroque. He adapted the Italian Baroque taste to the immensity of the landscape of St. Petersburg, his art is made of an amalgam of all these styles, which he has managed to transcend into an original synthesis, more Russian than European.[4]
Apart from some interiors, it is not quite correct to regard this style asRococo; for example, the fronts of the Winter Palace by Rastrelli, with exuberant colouredstuccos marked by mightycolonnades and delicate window openings, possess the solidity of the mature Baroque rather than the curvilinear lightness of the Rococo.[2]
The Elizabethan Baroque style is also found in the works of Muscovite architects of the mid-eighteenth century, particularly those ofDmitry Ukhtomsky andIvan Fyodorovich Michurin.[2] In St. Petersburg, with the empressElizabeth Petrovna, a host of architects competed in the realisation of palaces:Fyodor Semenovich Argunov [ru],Savva Chevakinsky,Andrey Kvasov, among others. The Swiss architectPietro Antonio Trezzini was the specialist in the field of religious buildings. With the exception of some constructions by Andrey Kvasov,Antonio Rinaldi,Johann Gottfried Schädel and Rastrelli'sSaint Andrew's Church in Kyiv, the style is rarely seen inUkraine.
After the death of the empress Elizabeth Petrovna, the construction orders were passed to Antonio Rinaldi, who had previously worked for the small courtyard of theOranienbaum Palace. He refused to imitate the grandiose achievements of Rastrelli and introduced the Rococo style into the architecture of the court. In the years following 1760, Rinaldi, like other renowned architects, abandoned theBaroque style and turned to the aesthetics ofClassicism.
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