Santa Maria in Campitelli te Rome 1665

This is Giovanni Battista Falda's engraving of Santa Maria in Campitelli in Rome, made in the latter half of the 17th century. Falda’s Rome was a city of stark social contrasts, a place where the opulence of the church stood in tension with the lives of the populace. The imposing facade of the church and surrounding buildings, rendered with precise lines, speaks to the power and grandeur of papal authority. Yet, observe the figures populating the square: rendered on a much smaller scale, they evoke a sense of everyday life unfolding in the shadows of these grand structures. Falda’s decision to include these ordinary citizens raises questions about the intersection of religious power and lived experience. What does it mean to practice faith under the gaze of such monumental architecture? How does the individual negotiate their identity within these imposing spaces of authority? Through Falda’s eyes, we witness not just the splendor of Rome, but also the complex negotiation of identity and power within its walls.