On Bramante

A new interpretation of the work of Bramante, suggesting an agenda for contemporary architectural practice

In On Bramante, architect Pier Paolo Tamburelli considers the work of the celebrated Italian Renaissance architect Donato Bramante and through this reappraisal suggests a possible agenda for current architectural practice. Bramante, Tamburelli argues, offers an excellent starting point to imagine a contemporary theory of space, to reflect on the relationship between architecture and politics, and to look back—with neither nostalgia nor contempt—at the tradition of Western classicism. 
 
Starting from a discussion of the difference in the work of Bramante in Milan (1481–1499) and Rome (1499–1514), Tamburelli highlights the peculiarities of Bramante’s architecture, especially in comparison to that of his predecessor Leon Battista Alberti and successor Andrea Palladio. This in turn opens up new possibilities for appreciating his spatial experiments, and to derive from Bramante’s abstraction and disassociation of form from function a revised theory of space for contemporary architecture. Such a theory might even advance a newfound political understanding of classicism, and a model—perhaps more valid now than ever before—for a public architecture. 

 

The text is bookended by a series of color photographic plates of Bramante’s works by photographer Bas Princen.



 Introduction VIII
PART I: LOGICAL WORK
INDIFFERENCE 2
1 Rome, wie ich sie vorfand 3
2 As a snake sheds its skin 7
3 La bella maniera degli antichi 10 
4 No style 16
5 Architecture implies the city 20
6 Pantheon + Basilca of Maxentius 25
UNIVERSALISM 30
7 Universal language 31
8 Architecture non parlante 34
9 Text envy 39
10 Architecture as painting 41
11 Order of all the orders 46
12 Against Roman architecture 50
13 Eclecticism and classicism 52
14 Classicism, colonialism 54
ABSTRACTION 58
15 Distance 59
16 Difficulta grandissima 61
17 Remote future 65
18 The object is simple 69
19 Form follows function 71
20 Abstract architecture is public 73
INTERMEZZO: DANTE, GIOTTO, PIERO, BRAMANTE 77
PART II: POLITICAL WORK
REALISM 96
21 After seeing the cathedral 97
22 Angeborener kritischer Verstand 101
23 Prevedari Engraving 107
24 Opportunities and propaganda 111
25 Tempietto 117
26 Kolossal 121
27 The conquest of Beauty 124
SPACE 128
28 Walls 129
29 Spectacle of pace 135
30 Space and images of space 144
31 Evidence of space 151
32 Experience of space 155
33 A brief and not all that complicated theory of space 157
34 Form of the void 158
COMMUNITY 162
35 Public work 163
36 Impresario 166
37 Work is exhausting 172
38 Public space 174
39 Public architecture is abstract 176
40 Architecture as art 181
41 Demolishing St. Peter's 184
42 Rebuilding St. Peter's 193
43 Ninety-five theses 202
Notes 206
Index 268Included in the New York Times's Best Art Books of 2022

"Is there any application today of Renaissance classicism to our glutted cities, anything the architect of St. Peter’s Basilica can teach builders of condos and duty-free concessions? Pier Paolo Tamburelli, an architect and editor of the now defunct cult magazine San Rocco, insists in this spirited treatise that Donato Bramante’s spatial innovations can propel a new practice of “architecture as public art.” Strange, sometimes flippant, as conversant with Rem Koolhaas as with Pope Leo X, this book is a rare effort to rethink our present deadlocks through historical models — and its ironic Neo-Classicism is beautifully buttressed by Bas Princen’s spare photographs of Bramante nerve centers: Milan’s Santa Maria delle Grazie, where Leonardo painted “The Last Supper,” or the cloisters of Rome’s Santa Maria della Pace."
– The New York Times

“On Bramante is a dense, rich, strange, and provocative book.”
–The Architect’s Newspaper

“A major event.”
–Arquitectura Viva“This book arrives at a moment when debates in the field over the role of history and architecture’s political imperatives are widespread. Tamburelli addresses both issues through detailed analysis situated in the history of the discipline. On Bramante presents a clear and at times brilliant argument that promises to revitalize architectural discourse.”
—Stan Allen, Stan Allen Architect; George Dutton ’27 Professor of Architecture, Princeton University
 
“There are many books on the history of architecture, many on modern architecture, but few that, like Tamburelli’s On Bramante, write about history in order to illuminate contemporary architectural concerns so brightly.”
—Sam Jacob, Sam Jacob Studio; Professor of Architecture, University of Illinois, Chicago
 
“Tamburelli’s On Bramante reveals the riddles and enduring importance of Bramante’s life and work. Mirroring the architect’s speculations on the possibility of a public art or common experience, we discover within its pages why the architecture of Bramante, and his preoccupation with space, is so relevant to our discussion of contemporary architecture and our belief in a collective public.”
—Sharon Johnston, Johnston MarkLee & Associates; Professor in Practice, Harvard Graduate School of Design
 Pier Paolo Tamburelli is an architect. One of the founding partners of baukuh and a former editor of San Rocco, he currently holds the Chair of Design Theory at the Technical University of Vienna.