The
English
word “Liberty” is used in Italian in an
architectural sense and has nothing to do with
politics, freedom or social struggle. It is
simply a man’s name: Arthur Lasenby Liberty (1843-1917), a
London merchant whose shop specialized in
ornaments, fabrics and miscellaneous art objects
associated with the then (the late 1800s)
emerging aesthetic movement known in French (and
in English) as Art Nouveau and in German as Jugendstil.
In
Italian,
the
original
designation was stile floreale [floral style] before Mr. Liberty’s
name was adopted. [note *] |
Palazzina Russo
Ermoli
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Galleria Principe di
Napoli
 Architecture
was only one facet of art nouveau; the approach was that
artists should work on everything from designing the
building to the furniture within. Art nouveau was
characterized in external architecture by
highly-stylized, flowing curvilinear forms as well as
the new materials of the Industrial Revolution;
abundant ornamentation both inside and out was
characterized by floral and other plant-inspired
motifs. This blend of nature and industry often
produced attractive effects, such as the glass and
metal arches set above mythological figures, garlands
and wreathes in the stone and stucco below of both the
Galleria Principe di Napoli
(photo) and the Galleria
Umberto in Naples. It was a strange combination
when you think of it: the rustic
floral designs (symbols of the tradition of the
individual craftsman) below and looking up to the
future filled with machinery and steel. The arms of
the figures are usually outstreched—to point to the future?—to
support it?—to implore it not to
give in to mass production? In any event, whatever
meeting of the minds art nouveau—this
new art—might
have represented did not survive the mass-productions
of the Great War. Art nouveau thus
had a relatively brief life and is said to be a bridge
between historicism (in which architects used
classical models) and the modernism of the 1920s.
Art
nouveau spread somewhat unevenly
throughout Italy as stile Liberty. Naples is not the first Italian city
that springs to mind when you mention the
style; that might be Milan. Yet Naples has a
great number of buildings loosely termed Liberty
napoletano. This new style at the
turn of the 19th-to-20th century coincided
almost exactly with the massive construction
projects of the Risanamento
and of the opening up of the new urban areas of Vomero
and Mergellina;
thus, there was in Naples a lot of opportunity
to put up such buildings. Entire areas of
Naples are defined by them: the rows of
turn-of-the-century buildings on both sides of
Corso Umberto, streets such as via Palizzi and
many others (all from the 1890s) in the Vomero
section, and the turn-of-the-century buildings
of via Helena (now via Gramsci) at Mergellina.
|
The
former Hotel Eden (now Villa
Maria) at Piazza Amedeo is from
1899-1901; architect-A. Trevisan.
|
On Corso Europa
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The
photos on this page have all been termed
“Liberty” by one source or another, but I have
a feeling that the term is so loosely applied
that it often winds up telling us simply when a
building was put and not what it looks like.
(Thus, the Mergellina
train station is often called Liberty
as well as barochetto
romano. The same goes for the Corte dei Leoni
in the Vomero section of Naples. (I have seen
it called Liberty
and also neo-Renaissance.)
It is not unusual for Italian to mix
chronology and style; if you say that
something is Umbertino in style, for
example, all you mean is that it was popular
during the reign (1878-1900)
of King Humbert I of Italy.
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My
favorite Liberty building in Naples is the Palazzina Russo Ermoli
(top photo) on via
Palizzi on the slope of the Vomero hill
overlooking the Chiaia section of town and the bay. It
was built at the end of the age of art nouveau,
precisely in the war years 1915 to 1918; the architect
was Stanislavo
Sorrentino. Since they redid the original
white and yellow to a grey/blue and white in 2007, the
building has just been popping off the hillside to my
glance. I had never noticed it and now there is this
odd cloud up there—coming close to evanescence...not
quite fluffy but fitting in with the fluff floating
miles above. I have no idea what a gingerbread house
looks like, but the Palazzina Russo Ermoli looks
edible. It has six floors and is set in the side of a
cliff and below street level such that entrance from
the street is across a tiny bridge to the fifth floor.
*note: The use did occur in
English at the time in reference to fabrics, but
apparently not architecture or the general art nouveau
movement. For example, from the Daily News
(London), 23 April 1888: "Her dress was of two
kindred shades of almost indescribable colour,
belonging to the class now commonly known as Liberty
tints." [back up to text]
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