The Arch of Titus

~A survey of the fortuna critica of the Trevi Fountain reveals a remarkable range of opinion regarding its style and artistic quality. Giovanni Bottari, writing while the Trevi was still under...

OF THE critical writing discussed in this book, that of Heinrich Wölfflin is by far the most widely read. There have been repeated attempts by art historians to belittle or dissociate themselves from Wölfflin’s general position while following the procedures of his detailed critical analyses. No great discernment has been needed to recognise that Wölfflin’s formalism is seriously limited, that there is something strained about the way he yokes architecture and painting, and that his cyclic view …