Illustration: Italian Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.
The chapter entitled Italian Ornament in Owen Jones 1856 The Grammar of Ornament was actually written by the critic, designer and artist Matthew Digby Wyatt. The chapter deals mainly with sixteenth century Italy and therefore starts with an introduction and small history of the Renaissance, drawing both similarities and differences between the ancient world and that of sixteenth century Italy. Digby Wyatt found time in this long chapter, one of the longest if not the longest chapter of text in the book, to highlight briefly the creative life of Michelangelo as well as that of Raphael.
Much is made of the transition from that of recognising the chief aspects of decoration and ornamentation and the sometimes less than perfect imitations that were produced supposedly in honour of the ancient style in sixteenth century Italy. Digby Wyatt notes the reduced scale in both mass and ambition of Renaissance decorators and designers in comparison to that of their Classical predecessors. However, he was aware that there had been a relatively broad skills base in the Classical period, and for the supreme decorative achievement of Nero's Golden House, there was also the mundane and the ordinary.
Illustration: Italian Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.
Digby Wyatt gives the impression that sixteenth century Italian decoration and ornament was much better served within the domestic, rather than that of the religious setting, where it often sat uncomfortably as a mismatched amalgamation of both Christian and Pagan ideals.
The chapter points out that Italian ornament cannot be seen as a universal phenomenon covering the entire Italian peninsula. It is pointed out that practically every Italian city had its own particular and distinctive flavour in both culture and the arts. This both adds to, but also in some ways, confuses the situation and therefore the chapter can only ever give a broad general definition of decoration and ornament in Italy during the sixteenth century.
Illustration: Italian Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.
This chapter also touches on both glass and metalwork crafts, particularly those associated with Venice, a city which comes in for a high level of praise from Digby Wyatt, as it did from many mid-Victorian art critics who saw the Venetian version of Gothic as particularly attractive and seductive. The high number of town halls and other public buildings in this style across the UK highlights the attraction.
There can be no doubt that Italy during the sixteenth century was a powerhouse of ideas that spanned an extraordinary number of topics and subjects within the cultural world of the period. That many of the ideas were transported outside of Italy, particularly to France, is well known. However, although Digby Wyatt was more than happy to acknowledge this fact, he was also aware of and drew attention to, the problems of decoration and ornament in eighteenth century Europe as interpreted by the mid-Victorians.
Illustration: Italian Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.
Both Bernini and Borromini are held up in this chapter as prime examples of seventeenth century excess. Digby Wyatt interprets them as supreme ambassadors of the excessive, overblown and self-important Baroque style that was to eventually transpose itself into the pernickety fussiness of Rococo. The chapter traces a line directly from Bernini and Borromini to that of Chinoiserie, which is seen as a degenerative eccentricity rather than that of a legitimate decorative style.
While this view may appear overly harsh, there is perhaps some truth in the idea that what merits were to be found in sixteenth century Italian decoration and ornament, were to be stretched so far out of their original shape and format as to become unrecognisable from the colour plates that Owen Jones produced for this particular chapter. To Digby Wyatt as to many mid-Victorian art critics, the Rococo decorative monster as they saw it, could only be vanquished by a modern day Imperial emperor in the mould of the original Classical world. Hence, the analogy at the close of this chapter on Italian ornament, with the rise of both Napoleon and the stern rendering of the Republican and later Imperial Neo-Classical style that violently swept away the Rococo amusements of the Ancient Regime.
Illustration: Italian Ornament from Owen Jones The Grammar of Ornament, 1856.
The Grammar of Ornament: All 100 Color Plates from the Folio Edition of the Great Victorian Sourcebook of Historic Design (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
The grammar of ornament
The Grammar of Ornament - Illustrated By Examples from Various Styles of Ornament - One Hundred and Twelve Plates
Grammar of Ornament: A Monumental Work of Art
The Grammar of Ornament. Folio Edition
Ornament and the Grotesque: Fantastical Decoration from Antiquity to Art Nouveau
Furniture and Interior Decoration of the Italian Renaissance
Italian Church Decoration of the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance: Functions, Forms, and Regional Traditions (Villa Spelman Colloquia)
Reviving the Renaissance: The Use and Abuse of the Past in Nineteenth-Century Italian Art and Decoration (Cambridge Studies in Italian History and Culture)
Ornament of the Italian Renaissance
Italian Wall Decorations Of The 15th And 16th Centuries - A Handbook To The Models, Illustrating Interiors Of Italian Buildings In The Victoria And Albert Museum, South Kensington.
