Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Self-Portrait of Bernini, circa 1623
Birth name	Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Born	(1598-12-07)7 December 1598 Naples, Kingdom of Naples, in present-day Italy
Died	28 November 1680(1680-11-28) (aged 81) Rome, Papal States, in present-day Italy
Nationality	Italian
Field	Sculpture, painting, architecture
Movement	Baroque
Works	David, Apollo and Daphne, The Rape of Proserpina, Ecstasy of Saint Theresa

Gian Lorenzo Bernini (also spelled Gianlorenzo or Giovanni Lorenzo) (Naples, 7 December 1598 – Rome, 28 November 1680) was an Italian artist who worked principally in Rome. He was the leading sculptor of his age and also a prominent architect. In addition he painted, wrote plays, and designed metalwork and stage sets.

A student of Classical sculpture, Bernini possessed the unique ability to capture, in marble, the essence of a narrative moment with a dramatic naturalistic realism which was almost shocking. This ensured that he effectively became the successor of Michelangelo, far outshining other sculptors of his generation, including his rival, Alessandro Algardi. His talent extended beyond the confines of his sculpture to consideration of the setting in which it would be situated; his ability to synthesise sculpture, painting and architecture into a coherent conceptual and visual whole has been termed by the art historian Irving Lavin the "unity of the visual arts."^[1] A deeply religious man, working in Counter Reformation Rome, Bernini used light as an important metaphorical device in the perception of his religious settings, often using hidden light sources that could intensify the focus of religious worship,^[2] or enhance the dramatic moment of a sculptural narrative.

Bernini was also a leading figure in the emergence of Roman Baroque architecture along with his contemporaries, the architect, Francesco Borromini and the painter and architect, Pietro da Cortona. Early in their careers they had all worked at the same time at the Palazzo Barberini, initially under Carlo Maderno and on his death, under Bernini. Later on, however, they were in competition for commissions and fierce rivalries developed, particularly between Bernini and Borromini.^[3][4] Despite the arguably greater architectural inventiveness of Borromini and Cortona, Bernini's artistic pre-eminence, particularly during the reigns of popes Urban VIII (1623–1644) and Alexander VII (1655–1665), meant he was able to secure the most important commission in the Rome of his day, St. Peter's Basilica. His design of the Piazza San Pietro in front of the Basilica is one of his most innovative and successful architectural designs.

During his long career, Bernini received numerous important commissions, many of which were associated with the papacy. At an early age, he came to the attention of the papal nephew, Cardinal Scipione Borghese, and in 1621, at the age of only twenty three, he was knighted by Pope Gregory XV. Following his accession to the papacy, Urban VIII is reported to have said, "Your luck is great to see Cardinal Maffeo Barberini Pope, Cavaliere; but ours is much greater to have Cavalier Bernini alive in our pontificate."^[5] Although he did not fare so well during the reign of Innocent X, under Alexander VII, he once again regained pre-eminent artistic domination and continued to be held in high regard by Clement IX.

Bernini and other artists fell from favour in later neoclassical criticism of the Baroque. It is only from the late nineteenth century that art historical scholarship, in seeking an understanding of artistic output in the cultural context in which it was produced, has come to recognise Bernini's achievements and restore his artistic reputation.

Early life[link]

Bernini was born in Naples to a Mannerist sculptor, Pietro Bernini, originally from Florence, and Angelica Galante, a Neapolitan, the sixth of their thirteen children.^[6][7] Bernini himself would not marry until May 1639, at age forty-one, when he wed a twenty-two year old Roman girl, Caterina Tezio, an arranged marriage that bore him eleven children.^[8] In 1606, at the age of eight he accompanied his father to Rome, where Pietro was involved in several high profile projects.^[9] There, as a boy, Gianlorenzo's skill was soon noticed by the painter Annibale Carracci and by Pope Paul V, and he soon gained the important patronage of Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the papal nephew. His first works were inspired by antique Hellenistic sculpture.

Rise to master sculptor[link]

Apollo and Daphne (1622–1625)

Under the patronage of the Cardinal Borghese, the young Bernini rapidly rose to prominence as a sculptor. Among the early works for the cardinal were decorative pieces for the garden of the Villa Borghese such as The Goat Amalthea with the Infant Zeus and a Faun, and several allegorical busts such as the Damned Soul and Blessed Soul. By the time he was twenty-two, he had completed the Bust of Pope Paul V. Scipione's collection in situ at the Borghese gallery chronicles his secular sculptures, with a series of masterpieces:

• Aeneas, Anchises, and Ascanius (1619) depicts three ages of man from various viewpoints, borrowing from a figure in a Raphael fresco. In The Aeneid, Aeneas flees the burning city of Troy, carrying his father and his son at his heels. His father holds the household gods and his son holds the eternal flame. Aeneas is the founder of Latium, later Italy, and the father of the Romans. The sculpture is in a very Mannerist upwards spiral.
• The Rape of Proserpina (1621–1622) recalls Giambologna's Mannerist Rape of the Sabine Women, and displays a masterful attention to detail, including the abductor "dimpling" the woman's marble skin.
• Apollo and Daphne (1622–1625) has been widely admired since Bernini's time; along with the subsequent sculpture of David it represents the introduction of a new sculptural aesthetic. It depicts the most dramatic and dynamic moment in one of Ovid's stories in his Metamorphoses. In the story, Apollo, the god of light, scolded Eros, the god of love, for playing with adult weapons. In retribution, Eros wounded Apollo with a golden arrow that induced him to fall madly in love at the sight of Daphne, a water nymph sworn to perpetual virginity, who, in addition, had been struck by Eros with a lead arrow which caused her to harshly spurn Apollo's advances. The sculpture depicts the moment when Apollo finally captures Daphne, yet she has implored her father, the river god, to destroy her beauty and repel Apollo's advances by transforming her into a laurel tree. This statue succeeds at various levels: it depicts the event and also represents an elaborate conceit of sculpture. This sculpture tracks the metamorphoses as a representation in stone of a person changing into lifeless vegetation; in other words, while a sculptor's art is to change inanimate stone into animated narrative, this sculpture narrates the opposite, the moment a woman becomes a tree.
• David (1623–1624) like the Apollo and Daphne, was a revolutionary sculpture for its time. Both depict movement in a way not previously attempted in stone. The biblical youth is taut and poised to rocket his projectile. Famous Davids sculpted by Bernini's Florentine predecessors had portrayed the static moment before and after the event; Michelangelo portrayed David prior to his battle with Goliath, to intimate the psychological fortitude necessary for attempting such a gargantuan task; the contemplative intensity of Michelangelo's David or the haughty effeteness of Donatello's and Verrocchio's Davids are all, nonetheless, portraying moments of stasis. The twisted torso, furrowed forehead, and granite grimace of Bernini's David epitomize Baroque fixation with dynamic movement and emotion over High Renaissance stasis and classical severity. Michelangelo expressed David's psychological fortitude, preparing for battle; Bernini captures the moment when he becomes a hero.

Mature sculptural output[link]

Ecstasy of St. Theresa (1647–1652)

Bernini's sculptural output was immense and varied. Among his other well-known sculptures: the Ecstasy of St. Theresa, in the Cornaro Chapel (see Bernini's Cornaro chapel: the complete work of art found in the Baroque section), Santa Maria della Vittoria, and the now-hidden Constantine, at the base of the Scala Regia (which he designed). He was given the commission for the Tomb of Pope Urban VIII in St Peters. He helped design the Ponte Sant'Angelo, sculpting two of the angels, soon replaced by copies by his own hand, while the others were made by his pupils based on his designs.

At the end of April 1665, at the height of his fame and powers he travelled to Paris, where he remained until November; he met Paul Fréart de Chantelou who kept a Journal of Bernini's visit.^[10] Bernini's international popularity was such that on his walks in Paris the streets were lined with admiring crowds. This trip, encouraged by Father Oliva, general of the Jesuits, was a response to the repeated requests for his works by King Louis XIV. Here Bernini presented some designs for the east front of the Louvre. which were ultimately rejected. He soon lost favor at the French court as he praised the art and architecture of Italy over that of France; he said that a painting by Guido Reni was worth more than all of Paris. The sole work remaining from his time in Paris is a bust of Louis XIV, which set the standard for royal portraiture for a century.

Architecture[link]

Bernini's architectural works include sacred and secular buildings and sometimes their urban settings and interiors.^[11] He made adjustments to existing buildings and designed new constructions. Amongst his most well known works are the Piazza San Pietro (1656–1667), the piazza and colonnades in front of St. Peter's Basilica and the interior decoration of the Basilica. Amongst his secular works are a number of Roman palaces: following the death of Carlo Maderno, he took over the supervision of the building works at the Palazzo Barberini from 1630 on which he worked with Borromini; the Palazzo Ludovisi (now Palazzo Montecitorio)(started 1650); and the Palazzo Chigi (now Palazzo Chigi-Odescalchi) (started 1664).

St. Peter's baldachin

His first architectural projects were the façade and refurbishment of the church of Santa Bibiana (1624–1626) and the St. Peter's baldachin (1624–1633), the bronze columned canopy over the high altar of St. Peter's Basilica. In 1629, and before St. Peter's baldachin was complete, Urban VIII put him in charge of all the ongoing architectural works at St Peter's. However, due to political reasons and miscalculations in his design of the bell-towers for St. Peter's, of which only one was completed and then subsequently torn down, Bernini fell out of favor during the Pamphili papacy of Innocent X.^[12] Never wholly without patronage, Bernini then regained a major role in the decoration of St. Peter's with the Pope Alexander VII Chigi, leading to his design of the piazza and colonnade in front of St. Peter's. Further significant works by Bernini at the Vatican include the Scala Regia, (1663–6) the monumental grand stairway entrance to the Vatican Palace and the Cathedra Petri, the Chair of Saint Peter, in the apse of St. Peter's.

Colonnade of Piazza San Pietro

Bernini did not build many churches from scratch, rather his efforts were concentrated on pre-existing structures, and in particular St. Peter's. He fulfilled three commissions for new churches; his stature allowed him the freedom to design the structure and decorate the interiors in a consistent manner. Best known is the small oval baroque church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, a work which Bernini's son, Domenico, reports his father was very pleased with.^[13] Bernini also designed churches in Castelgandolfo (San Tommaso da Villanova, 1658–1661) and Ariccia (Santa Maria Assunta, 1662-1664).

When Bernini was invited to Paris in 1665 to prepare works for Louis XIV, he presented designs for the east facade of the Louvre Palace but his projects were ultimately turned down in favour of the more stern and classic proposals of the French doctor and amateur architect Claude Perrault,^[14] signalling the waning influence of Italian artistic hegemony in France. Bernini's projects were essentially rooted in the Italian Baroque urbanist tradition of relating public buildings to their settings, often leading to innovative architectural expression in urban spaces like piazze or squares. However, by this time, the French absolutist monarchy now preferred the classicising monumental severity of Perrault's facade, no doubt with the added political bonus that it been designed by a Frenchman. The final version did, however, include Bernini's feature of a flat roof behind a Palladian balustrade.

In 1639, Bernini bought property on the corner of the via Mercede and the via del Collegio di Propaganda Fide in Rome. On this site he built himself a palace, the Palazzo Bernini, at what are now Nos 11 and 12 via della Mercede. He lived at No. 11 but this was extensively changed in the nineteenth century. It has been noted how very galling it must have been for Bernini to witness through the windows of his dwelling, the construction of the tower and dome of Sant'Andrea delle Fratte by his rival, Borromini, and also the demolition of the chapel that he, Bernini, had designed at the Collegio di Propaganda Fide to see it replaced by Borromini's chapel.^[15]

Fountains in Rome[link]

Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi

True to the decorative dynamism of Baroque, among Bernini's most gifted creations were his Roman fountains that were both public works and papal monuments. His fountains include the Fountain of the Triton or Fontana del Tritone and the Barberini Fountain of the Bees, the Fontana delle Api.^[16] The Fountain of the Four Rivers or Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi in the Piazza Navona is a masterpiece of spectacle and political allegory. An oft-repeated, but false, anecdote tells that one of the Bernini's river gods defers his gaze in disapproval of the facade of Sant'Agnese in Agone (designed by the talented, but less politically successful, rival Francesco Borromini). However, the fountain was built several years before the façade of the church was completed. Bernini was also the artist of the statue of the Moor in La Fontana del Moro in Piazza Navona (1653).

Marble portraiture[link]

Bust of Cardinal Armand de Richelieu (1640–1641)

Bernini also revolutionized marble busts, lending glamorous dynamism and animation to the stony stillness of portraiture. Starting with the immediate pose, leaning out of the frame, of bust of Monsignor Pedro de Foix Montoya at Santa Maria di Monserrato, Rome. The once-gregarious Cardinal Scipione Borghese, in his bust is frozen in conversation.

His most famous portrait is that of Costanza Bonarelli (c. 1637). It does not portray divinity or royalty, but a woman in a moment of disheveled privacy. Bernini had an affair with Costanza, who was the wife of one of Bernini's assistants. When Bernini suspected Costanza to be involved with his brother, he badly beat him and ordered a servant to slash her face with a razor. Pope Urban VIII intervened on his behalf and he was fined.^[17]

Bernini also gained royal commissions from outside Italy, for subjects such as Louis XIV, Cardinal Richelieu, Francesco I d'Este, Charles I of England and Henrietta Maria. The last two were produced in Italy from portraits made by Van Dyck (now in the royal collection), though Bernini preferred to produce portraits from life – the bust of Charles was lost in the Whitehall Palace fire of 1698 and that of Henrietta Maria was not undertaken due to the outbreak of the English Civil War.^[18][19]

Other works[link]

Gian Lorenzo Bernini in 1665, painted by Giovanni Battista Gaulli

The Elephant and Obelisk, affectionately known as Bernini's Chick by the Roman people, is located in the Piazza della Minerva and in front of the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. Pope Alexander VII decided that he wanted an ancient Egyptian obelisk to be erected in the piazza and in 1665 he commissioned Bernini to create a sculpture to support the obelisk. The sculpture of an elephant bearing the obelisk on its back was created by one of Bernini's students, Ercole Ferrata and finished in 1667. An inscription on the base aligns the Egyptian goddess Isis and the Roman goddess Minerva with the Virgin Mary who the church is dedicated to.^[20] A popular anecdote concerns the elephant's smile. To find out why it is smiling, the viewer must head around to the rear end of the animal and to see that its muscles are tensed and its tail is shifted to the left as if it were defecating. The animal's rear is pointed directly at the office of Father Giuseppe Paglia, a Dominican friar, who was one of the main antagonists of Bernini and his artist friends, as a final salute and last word.^[21]

The grave of Bernini in the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore

Bernini worked along with Ercole Ferrata to create a much admired fountain for the Lisbon palace of the Portuguese nobleman, the Count of Ericeira. For the same patron he also created a series of paintings with the battles of Louis XIV as subject. These works were lost as the palace, its great library and the rich art collection of the Counts of Ericeira, were destroyed along with most of central Lisbon as a result of the great earthquake of 1755.

The death of his patron Urban VIII in 1644 and the election of the Pamphilj pope, Innocent X, initially marked a downturn in Bernini's career and released a series of opportunities for Bernini's rivals. However, within several years, Innocent reinstated him at St Peter's to work on the extended nave and commissioned the Four Rivers fountain in the Piazza Navona. At the time of Innocent's death in 1655, Bernini was the arbiter of public artistic taste in Rome. His artistic ascendency continued under Alexander VII.

He died in Rome in 1680, and was buried in the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore.

Among the many who worked under his supervision were Luigi Bernini, Stefano Speranza, Giuliano Finelli, Andrea Bolgi, Filippo Parodi, Giacomo Antonio Fancelli, Lazzaro Morelli, Francesco Baratta Nicodemus Tessin, and Francois Duquesnoy. Among his rivals in architecture were Francesco Borromini and Pietro da Cortona; in sculpture, Alessandro Algardi.

The first biographies of Bernini[link]

The most important primary source for the life of Bernini is the biography written by his youngest son, Domenico, entitled Vita del Cavalier Gio. Lorenzo Bernino, published in 1713, though first compiled in the last years of his father's life (ca. 1675-80).^[22] Filippo Baldinucci's Life of Bernini, was published in 1682 and a meticulous private journal, the Diary of the Cavaliere Bernini's Visit to France, was kept by the Frenchman Paul Fréart de Chantelou during the artist's four-month stay from June–October 1665 at the court of King Louis XIV. Also there is a short biographical narrative, The Vita Brevis of Gian Lorenzo Bernini, written by his eldest son, Monsignor Pietro Filippo Bernini, in the mid-1670s, ^[23]

Until the late twentieth century, it was generally believed that two years after Bernini's death, Queen Christina of Sweden, then living in Rome, commissioned Filippo Baldinucci to write his biography which was published in Florence in 1682.^[24] However, recent research has suggested that it was in fact Bernini's sons (and specifically the eldest son, Mons. Pietro Filippo) who commissioned the biography from Baldinucci sometime in the late 1670s, with the intent of publishing it while their father was still alive. This would infer that firstly, that the commission did not come from Queen Christina who would have merely lent her name as patron and secondly, that Baldinucci's narrative was largely derived from Domenico Bernini's biography of his father.^[25] In sum, Domenico's biography, though published later than Baldinucci's, represents the earlier and more important full-length biographical source of Bernini's life, even though it may idealize a number of facts.

Selected works[link]

Sculpture[link]

Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi

Blessed Ludovica Albertoni

• Bust of Giovanni Battista Santoni (c. 1613–1616) Marble, life-size, Santa Prassede, Rome
• The Goat Amalthea with the Infant Jupiter and a Faun (1615) Marble, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• A Faun Teased by Children (1616–1617) Marble, height 132,1 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
• Martyrdom of St. Lawrence (1617) Marble, 66 x 108 cm, Contini Bonacossi Collection, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence
• St. Sebastian (1617–1618) Marble, Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
• Bust of Pope Paul V (1618) Marble, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Aeneas, Anchises, and Ascanius (1618–1619) Marble, height 220 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Bust of Giovanni Vigevano (1618–1631) Marble tomb, Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome
• Damned Soul (1619) Palazzo di Spagna, Rome
• Blessed Soul (1619) Palazzo di Spagna, Rome
• Neptune and Triton (1620) Marble, height 182,2 cm, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
• Bust of Monsignor Pedro de Foix Montoya (c. 1621) Marble, life-size, Santa Maria di Monserrato, Rome
• The Rape of Proserpina (1621–1622) Marble, height 295 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Bust of Antonio Cepparelli (1622) Marble, Museo di San Giovanni dei Fiorentini, Rome
• Apollo and Daphne (1622–1625) Marble, height 243 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• David (1623–1624) Marble, height 170 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• St. Peter's Baldachin (1624) Bronze, partly gilt, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City
• Fontana del Tritone (1624–1643) Travertine, over life-size, Piazza Barberini, Rome
• Charity with Four Children (1627–1628) Terracotta, height 39 cm, Museo Sacro, Musei Vaticani, Vatican
• Fontana della Barcaccia (1627–1628) Marble, Piazza di Spagna, Rome
• Tomb of Pope Urban VIII (1627–1647) Golden bronze and marble, figures larger than life-size, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City
• Saint Longinus (1631–1638) Marble, height 450 cm, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City
• Two Busts of Scipione Borghese (1632) Marble, height 78 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Bust of Pope Urban VIII (1632–1633) Bronze, height 100 cm, Museo Sacro, Musei Vaticani, Vatican City
• Charity with Two Children (1634) Terracotta, height 41.6 cm, Museo Sacro, Musei Vaticani, Vatican City
• Bust of Costanza Bonarelli (c. 1635) Marble, height 70 cm, Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence
• Bust of Thomas Baker (1638) Marble, height 81,6 cm, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
• Bust of Cardinal Armand de Richelieu (1640–1641) Marble, Musée du Louvre, Paris
• Truth (1645–1652) Marble, height 280 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Bust of Pope Leo X (1647) Palazzo Doria Pamphilij, Rome
• Ecstasy of St. Theresa (1647–1652) Marble, Cappella Cornaro, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome
• Loggia of the Founders (1647–1652) Marble, Cappella Cornaro, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome
• Memorial to Maria Raggi (1647–1653) Gilt bronze and coloured marble, Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome
• Bust of Urban VIII Marble, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City
• Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (1648–1651) Travertine and marble, Piazza Navona, Rome
• Corpus (1650) Bronze, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada.
• Daniel and the Lion (1650) Marble, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome
• Francesco I d'Este (1650–1651) Marble, height 107 cm, Galleria Estense, Modena
• Fountain of the Moor (1653–1654) Marble, Piazza Navona, Rome
• Constantine (1654–1670) Marble, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican City
• Daniel and the Lion (1655) Terracotta, height 41.6 cm, Museo Sacro, Musei Vaticani, Vatican City
• Habakkuk and the Angel (1655) Terracotta, height 52 cm, Museo Sacro, Musei Vaticani, Vatican City
• Altar Cross (1657–1661) Gilt bronze corpus on bronze cross, height: corpus 43 cm, cross 185 cm, Treasury of San Pietro, Vatican City
• Throne of Saint Peter (1657–1666) Marble, bronze, white and golden stucco, Basilica di San Pietro, Rome
• Statue of Saint Augustine (1657–1666) Bronze, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City
• Saint Jerome (1661–1663) Marble, height 180 cm, Cappella Chigi, Duomo, Siena
• Constantine (1663–1670) Marble with painted stucco drapery, Scala Regia, Vatican Palace, Rome
• Bust of Louis XIV (1665) White marble, height 105 cm, salon de Diane, Musée National de Versailles, Versailles
• Elephant and Obelisk (erected 1667) Marble, Piazza di Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome
• Standing Angel with Scroll (1667–1668) Clay, terracotta, height: 29,2 cm, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge
• Angel with the Crown of Thorns (1667–1669) Marble, over life-size, Sant'Andrea delle Fratte, Rome
• Angel with the Superscription (1667–1669) Marble, over life-size, Sant'Andrea delle Fratte, Rome
• Bust of Gabriele Fonseca (1668–1675) Marble, over life-size, San Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome
• Equestrian Statue of King Louis XIV (1669–1670) Terracotta, height 76 cm, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Herm of St. Stephen, King of Hungary Bronze, Cathedral of Zagreb Treasury, Zagreb
• Blessed Ludovica Albertoni (1671–1674) Marble, Cappella Altieri-Albertoni, San Francesco a Ripa, Rome
• Tomb of Pope Alexander VII (1671–1678) Marble and gilded bronze, over life-size, Basilica di San Pietro, Vatican City

Paintings[link]

Bernini's activity as a painter was a sideline which he did mainly in his youth. Despite this his work reveals a sure and brilliant hand, free from any trace of pedantry. He studied in Rome under his father, Pietro, and soon proved a precocious infant prodigy. His work was immediately sought after by major collectors.

• Self-Portrait as a Young Man (c. 1623) Oil on canvas, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Saint Andrew and Saint Thomas (c. 1627) Oil on canvas, 59 x 76 cm, National Gallery, London
• Self-Portrait as a Mature Man (1630–1635) Oil on canvas, Galleria Borghese, Rome
• Portrait of a Boy (c. 1638) Oil on canvas, Galleria Borghese, Rome

Gallery[link]

• 

  St. Peter's colonade

• 

  St. Peter's Square

• 

  St. Peter's baldachin

• 

  Ponte St. Angelo angels

• 

  Ecstasy of St. Theresa

• 

  Apollo and Daphne

• 

  Bust of Antonio Cepparelli

• 

  Bust of Pope Urban VIII

• 

  Self-portrait

References[link]

Further reading[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Gianlorenzo Bernini

• Checklist of Bernini's architecture and sculpture in Rome
• Excerpts from The life of the Cavaliers Bernini
• Gian Lorenzo Bernini in the "A World History of Art"
• Extract on Bernini from Simon Schama's The Power of Art
• Photographs of Bernini's Santa Maria Assunta
• smARThistory: Ecstacy of Saint Teresa, Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome
• Virtual tour of Rome visiting Bernini's key works
• List and discussion of the most recent scholarly discoveries regarding Bernini's biography and works

Simon Schama
Born	(1945-02-13) 13 February 1945 (age 67) London
Nationality	British
Institutions	Columbia University
Alma mater	Christ's College, Cambridge

Simon Michael Schama, CBE (born 13 February 1945) is a British historian and art historian. He is a University Professor of History and Art History at Columbia University.^[1] He is best known for writing and hosting the 15-part BBC documentary series A History of Britain. Other works on history and art include The Embarrassment of Riches, Landscape and Memory, Dead Certainties, Rembrandt's Eyes,^[2] and his history of the French Revolution, Citizens.^[1] Schama is an art and cultural critic for The New Yorker.^[1]

Life and early career[link]

The son of Jewish parents with roots in Lithuania, Romania, and Turkey, Schama was born in London.^[1][3] In the mid-1940s, the family moved to Southend-on-Sea in Essex before moving back to London. Schama writes of this period in the Introduction to Landscape & Memory (pp. 3–4)

I had no hill [the previous paragraph had talked of his enthusiasm for Puck of Pook's Hill], but I did have the Thames. It was not the upstream river that the poets in my Palgrave claimed burbled betwixt mossy banks. ... It was the low, gull-swept estuary, the marriage bed of salt and fresh water, stretching as far as I could see from my northern Essex bank, toward a thin black horizon on the other side. That would be Kent, the sinister enemy who always seemed to beat us in the County Cricket Championship. ...

In 1956 Schama won a scholarship to the independent Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School in Cricklewood, (from 1961 Elstree, Herts.), followed by Christ's College, Cambridge, reading history under J. H. Plumb and graduating with a Starred First in 1966.^[1]

He worked for short periods as a lecturer in history at Cambridge, where he became a Fellow and Director of Studies in History, and at Oxford, where he was made a Fellow of Brasenose College in 1976, specialising in the French Revolution.^[1] At this time, Schama wrote his first book, Patriots and Liberators, which won the Wolfson History Prize. The book was originally intended as a study of the French Revolution, but as published in 1977, it focused on the effect of the Patriot revolution in The Netherlands, and its aftermath.

His second book, Two Rothschilds and the Land of Israel (1978), is a study of the Zionist aims of Edmond James de Rothschild and James Armand de Rothschild.

He is married to Ginny Papaioannou, a geneticist from California; they have two children.^[4]

In the United States[link]

In 1980 Schama took up a chair at Harvard University. His next book, The Embarrassment of Riches (1987), again focused on Dutch history.^[5] In it, Schama interpreted the ambivalences that informed the Dutch Golden Age of the seventeenth century, held in balance between the conflicting imperatives, to live richly and with power, or to live a godly life. The iconographic evidence that Schama draws upon, in 317 illustrations, of emblems and propaganda that defined Dutch character, prefigured his expansion in the 1990s as a commentator on art and visual culture.^[6]

Citizens (1989), written at speed to a publisher's commission, finally saw the publication of his long-awaited study of the French revolution, and won the 1990 NCR Book Award. Citizens was very well received and sold admirably. Its view that the violence of the Terror was inherent from the start of the Revolution, however, has received serious criticism.^[1][7]

In 1991, he published Dead Certainties (Unwarranted Speculations),^[8] a relatively slender work of unusual structure and point-of-view in that it looked at two widely reported deaths a hundred years apart, that of General James Wolfe – and the famous painting by Benjamin West – and that of (by murder) George Parkman, uncle of the better known Francis Parkman. Schama mooted some possible (invented) connections between the two cases, exploring the historian's inability "ever to reconstruct a dead world in its completeness however thorough or revealing the documentation," and speculatively bridging "the teasing gap separating a lived event and its subsequent narration." Not all readers absorbed the nuance of the title: it received a greatly mixed critical and academic reception. Traditional historians in particular denounced Schama's integration of fact and conjecture to produce a seamless narrative^[9] but later assessments took a more relaxed view of the experiment.^[10] It was an approach soon taken up by such historical writers as Peter Ackroyd, David Taylor and Richard Holmes.^[11] Sales in hardback exceeded Schama's earlier works.^[12]

Schama at Strand Bookstore, New York City

Schama's Landscape and Memory (1995) focused on the relationship between physical environment and folk memory, separating the components of landscape as wood, water and rock, enmeshed in the cultural consciousness of collective "memory" that are embodied in myths, which Schama finds to be expressed outwardly in ceremony and text. While in many ways even more personal and idiosyncratic than Dead Certainties, roaming through widening circles of digressions, this book was also more traditionally structured and better-defined in its approach. While many reviews remained decidedly mixed, the book was a definite commercial success and won numerous prizes.^[13]

Appropriately, many of the plaudits came from the art world rather than from traditional academia. This was borne out when Schama became art critic for The New Yorker in 1995. He held the position for three years, dovetailing his regular column with professorial duties at Columbia University; a selection of his best essays on art for the magazine, chosen by Schama himself, was published in 2005 under the title Hang Ups. During this time, Schama also produced a lavishly illustrated Rembrandt's Eyes, another critical and commercial success. Despite the book's title, it contrasts the biographies of Rembrandt van Rijn and Peter Paul Rubens.

BBC[link]

In 1995 Schama wrote and presented a series called Landscape and Memory to accompany his book of the same name.

The year 2000 saw Schama return to the UK, having been commissioned by the BBC to produce a series of television documentary programmes on British history as part of their Millennium celebrations, under the title A History of Britain. Schama wrote and presented the episodes himself, in a friendly and often jocular style with his highly characteristic delivery, and was rewarded with excellent reviews and unexpectedly high ratings. There has been, however, some irritation and criticism expressed by a group of historians about Schama's condensed recounting of the British Isles' history on this occasion, particularly by those specialising in the pre-Anglo-Saxon history of insular Celtic civilisation.^[14] The series was eventually expanded to three, with 15 episodes^[15][16] produced in total covering the complete span of British history up until 1965;^[16] it went on to become one of the BBC's best-selling documentary series on DVD. Schama also wrote a trilogy of tie-in books for the show, which took the story up to the year 2000; there is some debate as to whether the books are the tie-in product for the TV series, or the other way around. The series also had some popularity in the United States when it was first shown on the History Channel.^[16]

In 2001 Schama received a CBE. In 2003 he signed a lucrative new contract with the BBC and HarperCollins to produce three new books and two accompanying TV series. Worth £3 million (around US$5.3m), it represents the biggest advance deal ever for a TV historian. The first result of the deal was a book and TV show entitled Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution, dealing in particular with the proclamation issued during the Revolutionary War by Lord Dunmore offering slaves from rebel plantations freedom in return for service to the crown.

In 2006 the BBC broadcast a new TV series, Simon Schama's Power of Art which, with an accompanying book, was presented and written by Schama. It marks a return to art history for him, treating eight artists through eight key works: Caravaggio's David with the Head of Goliath, Bernini's Ecstasy of St Theresa, Rembrandt's Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis, Jacques-Louis David's The Death Of Marat, J. M. W. Turner's The Slave Ship, Vincent van Gogh's Wheat Field with Crows, Picasso's Guernica, and Mark Rothko's Seagram Murals.^[17] It was also shown on PBS in the United States.^[18]

In October 2008 BBC broadcast a four-part television series called The American Future: A History presented and written by Schama. In March 2009, Schama presented a BBC Radio 4 show entitled 'Baseball and Me', both exploring the history of the game and describing his own personal support of the Boston Red Sox.

In 2010, Schama presented a series of ten talks for the BBC Radio 4 series A Point of View:

• Why We Like Tough Guys in Politics: When times are hard people seem to prefer tough leaders.
• Singing in the Rain: Schama looks forward to spring with personal reflections on the changing seasons.
• At the Heart of the Matter: The politics surrounding President Barack Obama's healthcare reforms.
• The Gift of the Gab: The history of political rhetoric and the power during election campaigns of televised debates.
• Behold, Newstralia!: Celebrates the distinctive history and culture of New Zealand and regrets any renewed talk of joining forces with Australia.
• A Welcome Slice of American Pie: Reflection on the quality of American food and eating habits.
• The Drama of Politics: The timeless drama of British politics.
• When Money is Just an Illusion: Reflection on the meaning of money as represented by coins and notes and in art.
• Hearts of Oak: Reflection on the significance of one of the sights that will greet new MPs in the chamber of the House of Commons - the panelling made of solid oak.
• Britain's New Politics: Reflection on the 2010 United Kingdom General Election, favourably comparing the British system for a swift handover of power to the cumbersome American one.

Politics[link]

Schama is a supporter of the Labour Party, donating £2,000 to Oona King's bid to become Labour's candidate for the 2012 London Mayoral election.^[19]

Israel[link]

Schama was critical of a call by British novelist John Berger for an academic boycott of Israel over its policies towards the Palestinians. Writing in The Guardian in an article co-authored with lawyer Anthony Julius, Schama compared Berger's academic boycott to policies adopted by Nazi Germany, noting "This is not the first boycott call directed at Jews. On 1 April 1933, a week after he came to power, Hitler ordered a boycott of Jewish shops, banks, offices and department stores."^[20]

In 2006 on the BBC, Schama debated with Vivienne Westwood the morality of Israel's actions in the Israel-Lebanon war.^[21] He characterised Israel's bombing of Lebanese city centres as unhelpful in Israel's attempt to "get rid of" Hezbollah.^[21] With regard to the bombing he said: "Of course the spectacle and suffering makes us grieve. Who wouldn't grieve? But it's not enough to do that. We've got to understand. You've even got to understand Israel's point of view."^[21]

United States[link]

Schama is a vocal supporter of President Barack Obama^[22] and critic of George W. Bush.^[23] He appeared on the BBC's coverage of the 2008 U.S. presidential election, clashing with John Bolton.^[24]

Writing style[link]

Schama has a literary way of writing that is attractive to both historians and a wider readership. It is "packed with evocative detail: rich fruit cakes crammed with raisins, currants, nuts and glacé cherries all mulled in brandy sauce".^[1] He has also received criticism for dumbing down history, presenting a "grossly oversimplified and mythologising view of the history of nations" and not fostering critical thinking.^[25]

Criticism[link]

Susan Buck-Morss criticizes Schama's The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age for its "selective national history" of the Dutch Republic, "that omits much or all of the colonizing story."^[26] "One would have no idea that Dutch hegemony in the slave trade (replacing Spain and Portugal as major players) contributed substantially to the enormous 'overload' of wealth that he describes as becoming so socially and morally problematic during the century of Dutch 'centrality' to the 'commerce of the world.'"^[27]

Publications[link]

Books

• Patriots and Liberators: Revolution in the Netherlands 1780–1813 (1977)
• Two Rothschilds and the Land of Israel (1978)
• The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age (1987)
• Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution (1989)^[1]
• Dead Certainties: Unwarranted Speculations (1991)
• Landscape and Memory (1995)^[2][13]
• Rembrandt's Eyes (1999)^[2]
• A History of Britain Vol. I (2000, ISBN 0-563-48714-3)
• A History of Britain Vol. II (2001, ISBN 0-563-48718-6)
• A History of Britain Vol. III (2002, ISBN 0-563-48719-4)
• Hang Ups: Essays on Art (2005)
• Rough Crossings (2005, ISBN 0-06-053916-X)
• Simon Schama's Power of Art (2006, ISBN 0-06-117610-9)^[18]
• The American Future: A History (2009, ISBN 0-06-053923-2)
• Scribble, Scribble, Scribble: Writing on Politics, Ice Cream, Churchill and My Mother

Documentaries

• Landscape and Memory (1995), in five parts
• Rembrandt: The Public Eye and the Private Gaze (1995)
• Simon Schama's A History of Britain – BBC (2000), in 15 parts
• Simon Schama's John Donne - 2009
• Murder at Harvard - PBS (2003)
• Rough Crossings – BBC (2005)
• Simon Schama's Power of Art – BBC (2006), in eight parts
• The American Future: A History – BBC (2008), in four parts
• Simon Schama's: Obama's America – BBC (2009).

Prizes & Other Honors[link]

• 1977 Wolfson History Prize, for Patriots and Liberators
• 1977 Leo Gershoy Award, for Patriots and Liberators
• 1987 New York Times Best Books of the Year, for The Embarrassment of Riches
• 1989 New York Times Best Books of the Year, for Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution
• 1989 Yorkshire Post Book Award, for Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution
• 1996 Lionel Trilling Book Award, for Landscape and Memory
• 1996 WH Smith Literary Award, for Landscape and Memory
• 2001 Broadcasting Press Guild Writer's Award, for A History of Britain
• 2001 Nominated for BAFTA Huw Wheldon Award for Specialised Programme or Series (Arts, History, Religion and Science), for A History of Britain
• 2002 Nominated for BAFTA Richard Dimbleby Award for the Best Presenter (Factual, Features and News), for A History of Britain
• 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award for Non-fiction winner, for Rough Crossings^[28]
• 2006 Hessell-Tiltman Prize Shortlist, for Rough Crossings
• 2007 Nominated for BAFTA Huw Wheldon Award for Specialized Factual Programme or Series, for Simon Schama's Power of Art
• 2008 The Daily Telegraph's 110 Best Books: The Perfect Library, for Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution

Notes[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Columbia History faculty page
• Columbia Art History faculty page
• "Free Fight", with Schama, offers "a new look at Britain, the United States, slavery and freedom during the Revolutionary War". The Brian Lehrer Show, 8 May 2006.
• Simon Schama’s The American History: A Future A Talk at the Shanghai International Literary Festival
• Audio: Simon Schama in conversation on the BBC World Service discussion programme The Forum
• Booknotes interview with Schama on Citizens, 14 July 1989.
• Works by Simon Schama on Open Library at the Internet Archive

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