Texts by Daniela di Castro, Gabriele Reina, Eduard A. Safarik
1999 / 136 PAGES
In the stately rooms of the Roman palace where the princes and cardinals of the powerful Altieri family enjoyed three centuries of glory, the gods of ancient Rome and the biblical patriarchs meet in impressive frescoes.
The book opens the doors to Palazzo Altieri, where the powerful family after which it was named lived for three hundred years. The palace was conceived as a stage for the public life of the Altieri family members and obeyed a series of rules formulated to adapt the architectural structure to the needs of a protocol that was so complex it required more than simply a "manual for use". The building's history is therefore intertwined with the history of the family, to which Pope Clement X and numerous cardinals belonged, as well as the history of art: the architectural design by Giovanni Antonio De'Rossi and the frescoes by Carlo Maratta made it an emblem of the Baroque in Rome.