Design for Elevation for Elaborate Wall and Vault with the Savoya Arms 1700 - 1780

Curator: At first glance, I'm hit by this feeling of opulent quiet. All these curves and details... like a very fancy dream. Editor: You're picking up on the Baroque aesthetic, certainly. We are looking at a "Design for Elevation for Elaborate Wall and Vault with the Savoya Arms." The piece dates to between 1700 and 1780, but the creator unfortunately remains anonymous. It's a drawing—a print, actually—on paper. Currently, it resides here with us at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Curator: The Savoya Arms… does that give us any hints as to its potential location? Was it a design meant to adorn, say, some duke's study? Editor: It’s quite possible. The architectural draftsmanship provides not just a surface-level image but encodes the social aspirations and artistic conventions of its time. Note the way perspective is employed. Curator: True. It almost feels like it's meant to overwhelm—that upward reach and detail… all very deliberate to make you feel small, perhaps? The scale is definitely exaggerated in the rendering. And what's with those little cherubs peeking out up there? Bit mischievous, no? Editor: Perhaps. They can signify innocence, beauty or love. Or something else; we must always proceed carefully with attributing specific intent. Structurally speaking, consider the interplay of geometric forms against the ornate embellishments. A sort of calculated harmony, no? Curator: Harmony… mmm, interesting. I still come back to that initial feeling, that echo of faded grandeur. Maybe it's the pale colors. This print gives us access to a dream, a lavish world of ornamentation, like catching glimpses of old European royalty. Editor: Precisely. Whether realized or remaining perpetually in the domain of blueprints, it allows the modern eye to travel back to the past and deconstruct its core ideology and assumptions. Curator: Right, right... Still, a nice wall! Editor: Indeed, something about it captures that moment of transition, of architecture serving ideology... or the opposite, maybe?