Giovan Antonio Rusconi (c. 1500–05; † 1578) was a Venetian

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

hydraulic engineer Hydraulic engineering as a sub-discipline of civil engineering is concerned with the flow and conveyance of fluids, principally water and sewage. One feature of these systems is the extensive use of gravity as the motive force to cause the mov ...

, translator and illustrator of

Vitruvius Vitruvius (; c. 80–70 BC – after c. 15 BC) was a Roman architect and engineer during the 1st century BC, known for his multi-volume work entitled '' De architectura''. He originated the idea that all buildings should have three attribut ...

Life

Apart from being introduced into building and painting young Antonio Rusconi studied mathematics at the

University of Padua The University of Padua ( it, Università degli Studi di Padova, UNIPD) is an Italian university located in the city of Padua, region of Veneto, northern Italy. The University of Padua was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from ...

under Giovanni Battista Memmo and

Niccolò Tartaglia Niccolò is an Italian male given name, derived from the Greek Nikolaos meaning "Victor of people" or "People's champion". There are several male variations of the name: Nicolò, Niccolò, Nicolas, and Nicola. The female equivalent is Nicole. The f ...

. Extensively consulting Vitruvius’ "Ten Books on Architecture" while he was constructing a novel type of

watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in the production of ...

Antonio became aware of many grave technical errors within the work's early Renaissance editions and commentaries. Finally Pietro Lauro, who had rendered Leon Battista Alberti's “De Architectura” into the vernacular, convinced Rusconi to set out with a translation of his own. The text was finished until 1552 and illustrated with more than three hundred supplementary

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas tha ...

s. Earlier, Rusconi had already provided the illustrations for Lodovico Dolce's version of the Ovidian “Metamorphoses”. Yet, since then countless treatises on architecture and commentaries on

(e.g. by

Daniele Barbaro Daniele Matteo Alvise Barbaro (also Barbarus) (8 February 1514 – 13 April 1570) was an Italian cleric and diplomat. He was also an architect, writer on architecture, and translator of, and commentator on, Vitruvius. Barbaro's fame is chief ...

, Gicaomo Vignola and

Andrea Palladio Andrea Palladio ( ; ; 30 November 1508 – 19 August 1580) was an Italian Renaissance architect active in the Venetian Republic. Palladio, influenced by Roman and Greek architecture, primarily Vitruvius, is widely considered to be one of ...

) were being published, Rusconi's Venetian editors, Giolito and Tommaso Porcacchi, saw no benefit in printing another title on the subject. Together with Palladio Rusconi draughted the "Palazzo municipale" (Brescia) in 1562, they also took part in rebuilding the Doge's Palace after the fire of 1577 and constructing the Palazzo Grimani. Nevertheless, throughout his life Rusconi's main occupation was that of a

for the

Republic of Venice The Republic of Venice ( vec, Repùblega de Venèsia) or Venetian Republic ( vec, Repùblega Vèneta, links=no), traditionally known as La Serenissima ( en, Most Serene Republic of Venice, italics=yes; vec, Serenìsima Repùblega de Venèsia, ...

. After having fallen gravely ill in 1575 Giovan Antonio died in 1579.

Rusconi's "Della Architettura"

Rusconi's “Vitruvius” was only printed after his death in 1590 by the son of his former editor Giolito. Although the latter recognised the value of Giovan Antonio's xylographies he considered his translation and annotations as outdated, and thus a strange “Vitruvius without Vitruvius“ was published: Just about 160 of originally 300

s were compiled with extracts from Fra Giocondo's and Cesariano's translations of Vitruvius’ treatise. For many of Rusconi's illustrations containing references to textual explanations, it is particularly regrettable that his translation has hence been lost.Cf. Thomas Reiser, ''Giovan Antonio Rusconi (1515/20–1579)'', in: ''Firmitas et Splendor. Vitruv und die Techniken des Wanddekors'', ed. by Erwin Emmerling, Andreas Grüner et al., Munich 2014 (Studien aus dem Lehrstuhl für Restaurierung,

Technische Universität München The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; german: Technische Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences. Establis ...

, Fakultät für Architektur) , pp. 269-276.

Editions

Rusconi, Giovanni Antonio – Della architettura, 1590 – BEIC 13212489

''Della architettura di Gio. Antonio Rusconi libri dieci''
edition of 1590 (digitalised by the

Bavarian State Library The Bavarian State Library (german: Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, abbreviated BSB, called ''Bibliotheca Regia Monacensis'' before 1919) in Munich is the central " Landesbibliothek", i. e. the state library of the Free State of Bavaria, the big ...

) * ''Della Architettura di Gio'' an''Antonio Rusconi'', Centro Internazionale di Studi di Architettura Andrea Palladio di Vicenza, with reprint of the 1590 edition, Testi e fonti per la storia dell’architettura, Verona and Vicenza 1996.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rusconi, Giovan Antonio Renaissance architects Architectural theoreticians Italian architecture writers 16th-century Italian architects Italian Renaissance architects 1579 deaths Architects from Venice Italian male non-fiction writers University of Padua alumni Year of birth uncertain