Bernini in Rome

Bill and I did not go looking for Bernini on this trip to Rome but Bernini came to us. Having said that, we did look for him at the Borghese Gallery.

There we found three early masterpieces: the horrific Aeneas, Anchises and Ascanius Fleeing Troy, 1619,

the arresting Rape of Persephone, 1622,

and the wholly successful David, 1624 -- all done when Bernini was in his early 20s.

In Palazzo Barberini we walked up a staircase designed by Bernini in 1630. (Don't miss the Borromini spiral staircase at the other end of the building.)

Bernini finished his show-stopping public masterpiece, the Fountain of the Four Rivers, in 1651 when he was 53.

The centrepiece of Piazza Navona, it is probably the best known and deservedly the most popular sculpture in Rome.

Bernini had help realizing his works. Giovani Antonio Mari executed the standing figure of a "Moor," at the south end of Piazza Navona, after a model by Bernini, in 1655.

The Turtle Fountain in Piazza Mattei was designed by the architect Giacomo della Porta in 1581. 

Bernini added the turtles in 1658. Everybody loved them. We've called it the Turtle Fountain (Fontana delle Tartarughe) ever since.

That same year Bernini built the church of Sant'Andrea al Quirinale on the Quirinal Hill. An unforgettable example of Roman Baroque.

Here is a glance at the interior rotunda.

Down the hill and across the centre to the Piazza della Minerva brings us to this charming elephant, unveiled in 1667 when Bernini was 69.

In 1671 he designed ten angels for the famous Bridge of Angels. Bernini carved the "Angel with the Superscription I.N.R.I." himself. He was 73 years old.

H. P. Morton said: "Even on the stillest of mornings, when there is not a breath of wind [...], these angels stand in some terrific seventeenth century gale."