Volume 45, Number 7 · April 23, 1998
How Great Art Was Made
By James Fenton
Gian Lorenzo Bernini: Sketches in Clay Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts, opened February 28, 1998
an installation from the permanent collection at the Fogg Art
Bernini's Rome: Italian Baroque Terracottas from the State Hermitage, St. Petersburg 1998; Philadelphia Museum of Art, May 16-August 2, 1998
an exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago, February 28-May 3,
From the Sculptor's Hand: Italian Baroque Terracottas from the State Hermitage Museum
catalog of the Chicago exhibition organized by Ian Wardropper
Art Institute of Chicago, 120 pp., $24.95 (paper)
Bernini: Genius of the Baroque
by Charles Avery, special photography by David Finn
Bulfinch Press, 287 pp., $75.00
Bernini's Scala Regia at the Vatican Palace: Architecture, Sculpture, and Ritual
by T.A. Marder
Cambridge University Press, 320 pp., $90.00
Italian Baroque Sculpture
by Bruce Boucher
Thames and Hudson, 320 pp., $14.95 (paper)
Gian Lorenzo Bernini was not an entirely nice man, and neither was his little brother, Luigi. One morning in 1638 Bernini saw Luigi leaving the house of his, Bernini's, mistress, who accompanied him to the door, Charles Avery tells us, 'in a suggestively dishevelled state.' Bernini, like most sculptors, was a strong man. He chased his little brother to their work place at St. Peter's, and went at him with a crowbar, breaking a couple of his ribs. Then he pursued him home, sword in hand. When his mother closed the door against him, Bernini broke it down. Meanwhile Luigi had taken refuge in Santa Maria Maggiore. Once again Bernini pursued him, but finally gave up beating on the door.
Review, 5690 words
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