Main entry:

Davis, Blair Hixson.

Title & Author:

The Roman drawings of Charles Percier / Blair Hixson Davis.

Publication:

2009.

Description:

viii, 378 p. ; 22 cm.

Notes:
Advisers: Carole Paul; Robert Williams.
"A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Art History"--t.p.
Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Santa Barbara, 2009.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 176-188).
Photocopy. Ann Arbor, Mich. : UMI Dissertation Services, c2009. viii, 378 p. ; 22 cm.

Summary:

"By the late eighteenth century many French architects were seeking fresh inspiration from Rome and the Italian tradition in their quest to reinvigorate the visual arts. One of the leading theorists and practitioners in this group was Charles Percier (1764-1838), who received the Prix de Rome scholarship for architecture offered by the Academie Francaise in 1786, and who would go on to become one of Napoleon Bonaparte's favorite architect-designers, and later one of the most influential teachers of architecture. As the Prix de Rome winner, he received funding from the French crown for five years of intensive study in Rome (1786-1791). Percier was a remarkably prolific student while in Rome, creating some two thousand drawings, an average of more than one image per day, not including official assignments from the academy. The bulk of the drawings, still unpublished, are now in the collection of the Bibliotheque de l'Institut de France."--P. vi.
"During his study in Rome, Percier cultivated an aesthetic that would guide his entire career, and his Roman drawings lie at the heart of this vision for correcting French art and architecture by adhering more closely to the ancients. He studied all the visual models Rome had to offer, recording diverse forms and motifs from the Renaissance, Egypt, and the early Christian period, in some cases from a historicist perspective, and in others as a classical essentialist."--P. vi-vii.
"Percier adopted the full range of visual models from Rome and applied them to his designs which dominated French taste in the Napoleonic period, broadening the types of visual motifs that were acceptable as models for architecture and decoration. Percier's early historicism laid the groundwork for later architects at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts who began to consider diverse historical models for the Romantic architecture in the mid-nineteenth century. The drawings document the transformation the city of Rome effected on Charles Percier, fundamentally influencing the direction of his creative process, and by extension, the direction of French architecture."--P. vii.

ISBN:

9781109100969
1109100965

Subject:

Percier, Charles, 1764-1838.
Architects France Biography.
Drawing, French 18th century.
Architectural drawing France History 18th century.
Neoclassicism (Architecture) France.
Architecture France History 18th century.
Architecture France History 19th century.
Architectes France Biographies.
Dessin français 18e siècle.
Néoclassicisme (Architecture) France.
Architecture France Histoire 18e siècle.
Architecture France Histoire 19e siècle.
Antiquities
Architects
Architectural drawing
Architecture
Drawing, French
Neoclassicism (Architecture)
Rome (Italy) Antiquities.
Rome (Italie) Antiquités.
France
Italy Rome
French architects.

Form/genre:

Biographies.
Theses.
History

Added entries:

University of California, Santa Barbara.

Holdings:

Location: Library main 276428
Call No.: BIB 211034
Status: Available