From Mannerism to High Baroque

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From Mannerism to High Baroque
(16th c.-early 18th c.)

Baroque sculptures and luxurious works of decorative art from the 17th c. dominate this room. Shaped in Rome in the 2nd half of the 16th c., at the same time as Mannerism, and mostly as its negation, Baroque spread fast through Europe. It brought to art a new sense of restlessness and excitement, and comprehended space open and infinite. In sculpture, artists were looking for painterly effects.

Baroque was also the style of the Catholic Counter-Reformation which restored Christian iconography by creating rules of representation which most artists strictly obeyed. Besides its expression of a sense of excitement there is also its other calmer form - known as Baroque Classicism.