Ritual: Baptism
Site: Battistero di San Giovanni
Location: Florence
Architect: Unknown
Year of Completion: c. 1128
Analysis: Tina Lim
150 word description goes here. Achum consulto ves faturi pria vignos complius con se aucest rehebatam te iam fue con vium percer am tam terbis, quonsul usulare ntilicaet, cuperei publincum, consimus, nostriore mei ilneque a volicio mus conerit, publin denatod itentes, qua actum init; ne ine pro, manum iam o inam ignaturis adem re ius consum inulocrem sedit vivatimmodiu sedit et prata cont nicatiq uemus, dium ingultortus nos etorterit, omprorunit gra dit atu morum ductam Romnihilium pernum inam etorae nem des M. Nostra in sus. Alessolus, o ves cotandenemus bondac in Itam. Sertamquam or ublicultus publin vernius, nos, sente it; C. Hoculis? Romnirita ne ina, quam patiam sedem que confirit, uropore morei cem, nor ad Catus muscred cris culicaesi imuricendam tam it, quitata sdaccio, mederior qui catus morterum omnicaes! Duc re cus es!
The Laurentian Library reveals not only the ritual of study, but the rituals of self-sorting, categorization, and the dissemination of knowledge. Mapping the convergence and divergence of paths from the scale of the city to the building to the desk and to the book helps to reveal how the Laurentian Library acts as a motherboard for organizing the ritual circuitry of Renaissance Florence.
The Library’s desks are crucial to how rituals are performed in the space. Because the books are chained to the desks and the desks are built into the architecture, there is direct connection between the knowledge that one seeks and the place where it is found. The desks categorize texts by subject, displaying titles found in them on the side. Accessing a book that’s next to the window while someone is already in the desk requires shuffling places.
The Laurentian Library’s form is reminiscent of a religious building, with reading desks acting as pews alongside the processional aisle. The language borrows from the religious context of the San Lorenzo complex in which the Library is situated. In fact, the original plan of Michelangelo included a triangular rare books room at the end of the reading room, reminiscent of the Holiest of Holies in the Temple of Solomon. The procession inside the library, up the flowing staircase into the reading room, acts as a funnel that all elite Florentines coming to the library must pass through, regardless of where they came from in the city or what bench is their ultimate destination. The tripartite interior facade of the vestibule reinforces the idea of rising from hell to purgatory to heaven in an ascent to knowledge.
Ultimately, the Laurentian Library acts as the motherboard of the city’s knowledge, centralizing and organizing the ritual circuitry of Renaissance Florence.
Ritual: Study
Site: Archiginnasio
Location: Bologna
Architect: Morandi
Year of Completion: 1563
Analysis: Helna Zhen
The Archiginnasio located in Bologna Italy was built n 1563 by Antonio Morandi. Its architecture consists of a loggia of 30 arches, central courtyard, two grand staircases that lead to the 10 scholastic halls, Stababt Mater lecture hall and anatomical theater. The sides of the rooms, the vaults of the grand staircases and open galleries are decorated with inscriptions and monuments commemorating the masters of the ancient university and thousands coats and arms and students’ names. The anatomical theater was built in 1637 for anatomy lessons by Bologna’s artist Antonio Paolucci and it is named after its amphitheatre form. The Stabat Mater lecture hall is a representative of the old university seat because it is richly decorated with it history, The library with the internal enfilade preserves documentary patrimony gathered over the ages in the Palazzo of the Archiginnasio.
Archiginnasio’s relationship to the city can be understood in its directionality and its repetition and continuity of the loggias. Following the main street of the loggias, the corridor and enfilade also reciprocates the same language in which users navigate.
Archiginnasio’s relationship within the building can be broken into three main elements of the anatomical theater, stabat mater lecture hall and the library enfilade. In these spaces, there is a clear linear path in its procession and how a user would navigate the space.
Archiginnasio’s relationship to the human body is best represented in the scale of bookshelves and anatomical theater seating in which the heights and dimensions of the seats are consistent across its longitudinal axis of the enfilade.
When thinking the Archiginnasio as a cohesive set with the scale of the city, building and body, we start to understand that there is a differentiation in its circulation of the loggias into the enfilade, anatomical theater and lecture hall.
