Pietro di Gottardo Gonzago

Gonzago, Pietro di Gottardo 

Born Mar. 25, 1751, in Longarone, near Venice; died July 25 (Aug. 6), 1831, in St. Petersburg. Italian painter, stage designer, and architect.

Gonzago studied in Venice and Milan, and he was influenced by A. Canaletto, G. B. Piranesi, and C. Galli Bib-biena. After 1792 he worked in Russia. He painted architectural state designs in perspective in the spirit of classicism, mainly for court theaters (and also for the theater in Arkhangel’sk). Gonzago’s decorations are distinguished by the harmonic clarity of architectural forms and the close connection between design and scenic action. Gonzago also painted monumental decorative murals, which, because of illusory effects, served as a sort of continuation of actually existing architecture (the murals in the so-called Gonzago Gallery in the Pavlovsk Palace, 1822–23, partially preserved). He participated in the planning of parks in Pavlovsk and elsewhere.

WORKS

Information à mon chef ou éclaircissement convenable du décorateur-théâtral Pierre Gothard Gonzague sur l’exercice de sa profession. St. Petersburg, 1807. (A Russian translation of one section is in the book Mastera iskusstva ob iskusstve, vol. 6. Moscow, 1969. Pages 144–57.)
La Musique des yeux et l’optique théâtrale. St. Petersburg, 1807.

REFERENCES

Zemtsov, S. “P’etro Gonzaga.” Dekorativnoe iskusstvo, 1970, no. 12.
Scenografia di Pietro Gonzaga: Mostra, Venezia, 1967. Venice, 1967. (Catalog.)