Who is Baroque?

The original meaning of the word baroque refers to an irregular pearl, which was derogatory at that time. At that time, people thought that its gorgeous and ostentatious style belittled the Renaissance style, but now it has been recognized that Baroque is a great artistic style in Europe.

The classicists thought Baroque was a degenerate art, and only later did they have a fair evaluation of Baroque art ... Baroque art came into being in the second half of16th century and reached its peak in17th century. Except for northern and central Europe, it gradually declined. Barovin art originated in Italy, which is undoubtedly related to the anti-religious reform. Rome was the center of church power at that time, so it was not surprising that it rose in Rome. It can be said that Bagok art was not invented by religion, but it served the church and was used by religion, and the church was its most powerful pillar. Generally speaking, baroque art has the following characteristics: first, it has the characteristics of luxury, both religious and enjoyable; Secondly, it is a passionate art, which breaks the tranquility and harmony of reason, has a strong romantic color and attaches great importance to the artist's rich imagination. Thirdly, it strongly emphasizes movement, movement and change, which can be said to be the soul of baroque art; Fourth, pay great attention to the sense of space and three-dimensional sense of the works; Fifth, comprehensive. Baroque art emphasizes the comprehensive means of art forms, such as the integration of architecture, sculpture and painting. In addition, Baroque art also absorbed some factors and imagination in literature, drama, music and other fields. Sixth, it has a strong religious color, and religious themes occupy a dominant position in baroque art; Seventh, Baroque artists tend to stay away from life and times. For example, in some zenith paintings, the image of people becomes insignificant, just like some patterns. Of course, some active baroque masters are not in this case, such as Rubens and Benigni, whose works and lives are still closely related.

There are two views on the origin of baroque, which have great influence. Italian Croce and others think that it originated from Baroco and was originally a special term of syllogism in logic. On the other hand, it comes from baroco in Portugal or barrueco in Spain, which means all kinds of irregular pearls, and is extended to "unconventional". Baroque was first applied to art criticism before the end of 17, which generally refers to all kinds of unconventional and bizarre things. /kloc-used as a derogatory term in the 0/8th century, generally referring to violation of natural laws and classical artistic standards. Until the middle of19th century, it was still a derogatory term, not an artistic style. 1888 H. Woelfflin published the book Renaissance and Baroque, which systematically discussed the Baroque style, and then defined the Baroque concept as an artistic style. In the 20th century, western scholars made a deeper study of Baroque and gave it different meanings, but as an artistic style, understanding is still the mainstream.

Baroque architecture is an architectural and decorative style developed on the basis of Italian Renaissance architecture in 17 ~ 18 century. It is characterized by free appearance, dynamic pursuit, rich decoration and sculpture, strong color, and commonly used curved surface and oval space.

The original meaning of the word baroque is grotesque, and classicists use it to refer to this architectural style that is considered to be deviant. This style played an important role in opposing rigid classical forms, pursuing free and unrestrained styles and expressing secular interests, and influenced city squares, garden art and even literary and art departments. It was once widely popular in Europe.

The Jesuit church in Rome, designed by the famous Italian architect and architectural theorist Vignola in the late Renaissance, is a masterpiece of the transition from technicalism to baroque style, and some people call it the first baroque building.

Handicraft is an artistic style in Europe in the late16th century. Its main feature is the pursuit of weird and unusual effects, such as expressing space in a deformed and uncoordinated way and expressing characters in an exaggerated slender proportion. In the history of architecture, it refers to the tendency of early baroque style in the works of some Italian architects from 1530 to 1600.

The Jesuit church in Rome has a rectangular plane with a shrine at the end, which evolved from the Latin cross used in Gothic churches. The central hall is wide, and the vault is covered with statues and decorations. Two rows of small prayer rooms were used on both sides to replace the original side porch. A dome rises in the middle of the cross. The altar of the church is richly decorated and free, and the mountain flowers on it break through the classical French style, making icons and decorating the lights. The facade of the church draws lessons from the treatment method of Santa Maria, a small Florence church designed by Alberti, an architect in the early Renaissance. The eaves and mountain flowers above the main entrance are made into overlapping arcs and triangles, and inclined columns and flat pilasters are used on both sides of the main entrance. There are two pairs of large scrolls on both sides of the upper part of the front. These therapies were unique and were widely imitated later.

Baroque style broke the blind worship of Vitruvius, an ancient Roman architectural theorist, and also broke through all kinds of rules and regulations formulated by classicists in the late Renaissance, reflecting the secular thought of yearning for freedom. On the other hand, the baroque church is magnificent, which can create a very strong mysterious atmosphere and meet the requirements of the Catholic church to show off its wealth and pursue mystery. Therefore, Baroque architecture originated in Rome and soon spread all over Europe, even as far away as America. Some baroque buildings pursue luxury and verve too much, even to the point of being bulky and piled up.

Since 1930s, the wealth of Italian churches has been increasing day by day, and all parishes have built their own baroque churches. Because of its small scale, it is not suitable to use Latin cross plane, so it is mostly changed to single-space halls such as round, oval, plum blossom and round petal cross, and curved surfaces are widely used in modeling.

A typical example is the church of San Carlo in Rome, which was designed by Borromini. Its temple plane is approximately olive-shaped, and there are some irregular small prayer rooms around it; There is also a living courtyard. The hall plane and ceiling decoration emphasize dynamic curve, the vertical mountain flowers are disconnected, the cornice is horizontally bent, the wall is concave and convex, and the decoration is rich, which has a strong light and shadow effect. Although the design technique is skillful, it is inevitable that there is a feeling of affectation. /kloc-after the middle of the 0/7th century, baroque churches became popular in Italy. There are many novel and original works, but there are also buildings with poor technology and excessive stacking.

In order to show off the wealth of papal countries to pilgrims, the papal authorities built wide avenues and magnificent squares in Rome, which opened up a new road for the free and unrestrained style of Baroque.

Roman Polo Square, built by Roman architect fontana in the17th century, is the intersection of three radial main roads, with an obelisk in the center and statues and green belts around it. There are two symmetrical churches with the same style between the radial main roads. This square is open and unrestrained, and many European countries are scrambling to follow suit. France built a radial square in front of Versailles Palace, and Russia built a radial square in front of the Admiralty Building in Petersburg. The square in front of St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome was designed by bernini, an outstanding baroque architect and sculptor, and is surrounded by the Tuscan colonnade in Rome. The whole layout is bold and dynamic, and the light and shadow effect is strong.

Baroque architectural style is also very popular in some countries in Central Europe, especially Germany and Austria. /kloc-in the second half of the 0/7th century, many German architects combined Italian Baroque architectural style with German national architectural style after returning from studying in Italy. By the first half of18th century, German Baroque architecture had become a wonderful work in the history of European architecture.

Baroque church in Germany is simple and elegant in appearance, soft in shape, less in decoration, dry and flat in exterior wall, and in harmony with the natural environment. The interior decoration of the church is very gorgeous, which creates a strong contrast between the inside and the outside. Famous examples are the Fourteen Saints Pilgrimage Church in the suburbs of Bamberg and Abbey Church in Roche.

The layout of the pilgrimage church of the Fourteenth Saints is very novel. The main hall and shrine are made into three continuous ellipses, and the arched ceiling echoes this. The interior of the church is covered with all kinds of plant-like decorative patterns made of lime mud, which is magnificent. The appearance of the church is relatively dull, with a pair of towers on the front, dotted with soft curves and full of intimacy.

The appearance of Roche Abbey Church is also very simple, and the interior decoration is also very exquisite, especially the ceiling above the shrine is covered with flying angels carved with white marble, and in the middle of the shrine is a group sculpture composed of the Virgin and two angels; Below the shrine is a group of statues of saints with different expressions.

Austrian baroque architectural style was mainly imported from Germany. /kloc-In the first half of the 8th century, many famous buildings in Austria were designed by German architects. For example, the Shubelen Palace in Vienna is a serious classical architectural form, while the interior hall is Italian Baroque style. All the pillars in the hall are carved into human shapes, and the pillars and vaults are covered with relief decoration, which is the product of the combination of baroque style and classical style.

It rose in the middle of17th century, with free and unrestrained style and complex and changeable modeling, but some architectural decorations were piled up too much. Santiago Cathedral in Spain is a typical example of architecture in this period.

The Baroque period of music is generally considered to be roughly from 1600 to 1750, that is, from Montville to Bach and Handel.

In fact, the most important feature of Baroque music is its accompaniment, that is, basso continuo. Basso continuo player plays bass on harpsichord or organ (or plucked instrument pipa or guitar), and the numbers on it indicate the full chord he should play. Basso continuo is usually played by two people. One plays the bass part with cello (or viola or bassoon), and the other plays the full string part.

This texture using basso continuo is: the melody part of human voice or musical instrument is above, the bass instrument is below, and the harmony is in the middle. This is typical Baroque music. There are often two voices on it, sometimes written for two singers, and sometimes two violins (called a triple sonata at this time). This structure is also typical in baroque music, especially in basso continuo, which shows how important and core the concept of harmony produced by bass is to baroque music. The emergence of this concept is not sudden. In the16th century, the bass voice in polyphonic music was distinguished from the above lines, but it was not until the Baroque period that this style was clearly determined.

Together with and related to the above changes, it is to give up polyphony (more precisely, polyphony music has become an old-fashioned method, which is almost only used in a certain kind of music in the church). Attaching importance to harmony will inevitably lead to several termination points of harmony series in a piece of music, which are called termination points or convergence points, and are formed by a series of harmony series with a certain level. Related to this is the progress of rhythm. In vocal music, melody must follow (or even exaggerate) the natural rhythm of language to express the emotion of lyrics. Useful for dance rhythm in instrumental music (including some vocal music, especially chorus). Because bass uses the rhythm of dance music, it accelerates the development of tonality and tends to a certain tone.

At the same time, the emergence of new musical instruments has also accelerated this process, the most important of which is the violin family. At that time, the violin pronunciation was suitable for the clarity of polyphonic music, but it lacked a sense of rhythm and strength. However, the violin's clean and lively bow action and the ability to play brilliant technical music are suitable for playing dance rhythm music, which is more skillful than single-part songs. The alternation of vocal music style and instrumental music style is a typical baroque technique. There are two different styles in baroque music for novelty and effect.

The important musical forms in the early Baroque period were single-part songs (as opposed to polyphonic music in the early period) and related operas and oratorios, which emphasized the close combination of sound and music and also played a role of setting in opera. Monolithic music does not use counterpoint method, and its musical form is developed by combining melody with bass, such as segmented musical form, echo music structure, variation on repeated bass part, etc. There has also been a corresponding development in musical instruments, such as the ensemble instruments suitable for playing basso continuo and the instruments suitable for playing the violin instead of the violin family. Violqin's family musical instruments are more flexible and can play a higher range.