The Invisible 

Cities

II

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "The Tower of Babel" (of Vienna), 1563.

Source: Google Art Project, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria.

Realism and abstraction in:

Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525-30-1569)

Hans Vredeman de Vries (c. 1527-c. 1607),

Wenceslaus Hollar (1607-1677),

Hugh Ferriss (1889-1962).

Work on perspective by Hans Vredeman de Vries.

Source: Deutsche Fotothek in Dresden, Germany Saxon State Library.

THE LIVING CITY

Once again. “All fine architectural values are human values, else not valuable.” Humane architectural values are life-giving always, never life-taking.

Extract from “The living city” by Frank Lloyd Wright, Part Three, “Decentralization”: Recapitulation; Horizon Press, New York 1958.

Ancora una volta. "Tutti i bei valori architettonici sono valori umani, oppure non hanno valore". I valori architettonici umani sono sempre datori di vita, dalla vita non prendono mai nulla.

Tratto da "La città vivente" di Frank Lloyd Wright, Parte terza, "Decentramento": Riepilogo, Giulio Einaudi editore, Torino, 1991.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Windsor Castle".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "London before and after the fire".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Work into the  perspective by Hans Vredeman de Vries.

Source: Deutsche Fotothek in Dresden, Germany Saxon State Library.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "Four-master and Two Three-masters Anchored near a Fortified Island from The Sailing Vessel", 1561-65.

Source: THE MET, Metropolitan Musum of Art, New York.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "English Lady in Winter Costume"

(The Winter habit of an English Gentlewoman), 1644.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Hans Vredeman de Vries:

"Christ in the house of Martha and Mary", 1556. Source: The Royal Collection Trust, Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace, London, U.K.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Head of a Young Black Boy

in Profile to the Right", 1645.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Frans Hals: Portrait of René Descartes (1596-1650), 1649,

source: Wikipedia.

Rumold Mercator (1545-1599), cartographer: 

picture taken from "Orbis terrae compendiosa descriptio

Quam ex Magna universali Gerardi Mercatoris",

Bibliothéque nationale de France, Paris, France; www.gallica.bnf.fr .

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "Big fish eat little fish", 1556,

Albertina Museum, Vienna, Austria. Source: Google Art Project.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "God calls Abraham".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Letter A".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

VER:WEST: "Elements Of A New Life", Netherlands, 2021.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Town and country mouse".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "Hunters in the snow" (Winter), 1565,

Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Source: Google Art Project.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "The fly and the ant".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder: "The Peasant Wedding", 1567.

Source: Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; Google Art Project.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "The sick kite and its mother".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Hendrik Hondius: "Nova Totius Terrarum orbis Geographica ac Hydrographica Tabula", 1641, Nasjonalbiblioteket, Oslo, Norway; www.nb.no . Data source: Wikimedia Commons.

Book header of "Le Monde", 1664, in Paris, by René Descartes.

Source: gallica.bnf.fr, Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Glastoniensis" (Glastonbury).

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Boar, after Cranach".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "The prospect of Bermingham" (Birmingham).

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Bust of a deformed old woman with one tooth, facing left", after Leonardo da Vinci, 1665.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: "Questo è Pietro Aretino, Poeta Tosco, 1640

(This is Pietro Aretino, Tuscan Poet).

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: "Naves Mercatoria Hollandiae

Societas Indiae Orientalis" (Dutch East Indiaman), 1647.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Nicaolas Malebranche: "De la Recherche de la verité"

(On Search for the truth), in Paris, 1678.

Source: gallica.bnf.fr, Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Hans Vredeman de Vries: from "Variae architecturae formae", 1636. Source: Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Dutch Freighters or Flutes"

("Naues Mercantoriæ Hollandicæ, vulgo VLIETEN"), 1647.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Charonia tritonis".

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "A yacht and three warships in a storm", 1665.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Wenceslaus Hollar:ca. 1646 - "Shell: Hebrew Volute, Voluta ebraea".

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Interior of the crypt of St Paul's" (St. Faith).

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "Dead Mole", 1646.

Source: THE MET, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Wenceslaus Hollar: "London before and after the fire", 1666.

Source: The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library of

University of Toronto - The W. Hollar Collection.

Gustave Doré: 1886, Illustration from the book

"Aventures du Baron de Münchhausen" by Rudolf Erich Raspe.

Source: gallica.bnf.fr - Bibliothèque nationale de France.