Modelle und Architektur Les Maquettes d ... - Aktuell - TUM

Zusammenfassungen - Résumés - Abstracts
Role and function of models in biographies of famous artists of
the 16 th century by Giorgio Vasari
The study analyses character, role and function of architectural models regarding
especially the biographies of famous artists of the 16 th century by Giorgio Vasari
(“Vite”). In the Renaissance models attain a strategic role: by transferring the project
into the material, the opportunity of capturing the project on first sight occurs – even to
those observers being unable to read the orthogonal plan drawings.
Models are not just three-dimensional previews of the building, more realistically and
more directly than drawings, but take on different roles according to Renaissance
habits. Models are representations for all concerned with the project and, moreover,
they are a notarial tool and scaled archetype for calculations. Within the model the
construction would be defined, showing all dimensions. They are bases for the
organisation of building sites and offer a basis true to scale for calculations and cost
estimates.
Significantly, Filipo Baldinucci defines models as follows: “They serve architects to
define lengths, widths, heights and dimensions: number, extend, kind and quality of all
parts, how they should be ideally; so the work will be perfect: also they serve to discuss
the miscellaneous craftsmen, which have to be employed to accomplish the building;
as well to ascertain the financial effort required.”
The mentioned above applies to wooden models, which show a final status of the
project, as being representations to scale they require neat and correct plan drawings
as well as the work of a `magister lignarius´. Wooden models represent the diversity
between idea and actual piece of work, as they form an intermediate result between
the geometrical drawing and the craftsmanship of the carpenter arising between artist
and product.
Next to these working models there are plastical models, originating directly from the
hand of the artist and therefore bearing the original idea like an imprint. While the wooden
models point out the limits of an idea, to which the construction is bound,
models from clay or wax, as occurring in the life of Michelangelo, illustrate an
exquisitely iridescent variety.
Modelle und Architektur - Les maquettes et l´architecture - Models and Architecture 37