In his biography, the
great Michelangelo says that when he was an infant, he "took in the
dust" of an old workshop where classical sculpture had been made
for generations. This, he claimed, was how he inherited the
sculptural greatness of his ancient Roman ancestors. Of
course, Michelangelo also had to work a little to become the
greatest classical sculptor in history. He and his Italian
Renaissance contemporaries studied the art and architecture of
ancient Rome with unsurpassed interest. They maintained, restored,
and even revived millennia-old classical designs. In the centuries
that followed, artists and artisans in academies and workshops
across Europe and America carried on the Renaissance tradition.
Thanks to them, classical designs survive to the present
day.
At Four Sams Concrete workshop in
Scranton, PA, designs for benches, birdbaths, white concrete urns,
the Virgin Mary, the Piet, and angels can be traced back to
precedents from ancient Rome and the Italian Renaissance.
So, from Four Sams to you, "Venuto a
Scranton, visiti la nostra officina, e respiri la polvere di Roma
antica (Come to Scranton, visit our workshop, and breathe the dust
of ancient Rome)."
Serlio's Architettura
