THE BAROQUE ARCHITECTURE OF SICILY

Anthony Blunt once described Sicilian Baroque as the style ‘in which the energy and imagination of the south attained full and mature expression’. More and more it is being recognised that this era in the island’s history should be burned into our memory as a crucial phase of Western civilization – a view that this volume superbly affirms and reinforces.

It seeks by analysis and above all by revelatory photography to define what makes the Baroque of Sicily distinctive.

• How does it differ from the Baroque not only of other countries but also from that of other Italian regions?
• How was it possible to impose that particular character upon churches and palaces, sculpture and painting?
• What was the role of ‘capital’ cities such as Palermo and Catania, and smaller towns like Noto?
• To what extent did it absorb styles from abroad, both through travel and through pictures and treatises?
• How decisive was that Sicilian speciality, the earthquake, as a factor in change and renewal?

All these questions go to the heart of an architecture that was open to the whole world of European Baroque and yet stubbornly protective of its own unique identity.

Maria Giuffré is a professor at the School of Architecture, Palermo University. Melo Minnella has photographed Sicily’s artistic and cultural heritage for many years, and has published several books on the subject.