Background
Francesco Borromini was born on September 25, 1599, at Bissone, near Lugano in the Ticino, which was at the time a bailiwick of the Swiss Confederacy.
Supreme Order of Christ
Sant'Agnese in Agone, Rome, Italy
Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza, Rome, Italy
Oratory of S. Filippo Neri, Rome, Italy
San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Rome, Italy
Francesco Borromini was born on September 25, 1599, at Bissone, near Lugano in the Ticino, which was at the time a bailiwick of the Swiss Confederacy.
As a boy, Borromini was sent to Milan to learn stonecutting. After several years training in the skills and technology of both architecture and sculpture, he collected a debt owed to his father and, without informing his parents, fled to Rome in 1620.
There he started working for Carlo Maderno, his distant relative, at St. Peter's and then also at the Palazzo Barberini. When Maderno died in 1629, he and Pietro da Cortona continued to work on the palace under the direction of Bernini. Once he had become established in Rome, he changed his name from Castelli to Borromini, a name deriving from his mother's family and perhaps also out of regard for St. Charles Borromeo.
In the 1630s Borromini began to receive independent commissions, and his fame grew rapidly. In 1632 he commenced work at the Palazzo Spada. His famous gallery, designed with an illusionistic effect of perspective, has an unexpected wit that must have helped to make Borromini's name known.
Far more important was Borromini's work at S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, begun in 1634. This tiny church, along with its courtyard, is one of the most important monuments of the baroque style in Rome. The work was divided into two phases almost 30 years apart, with the cloister and church designed and largely built in the 1630s and the facade designed in 1662 and still incomplete at Borromini's death. Owing to the fortunate survival of a considerable number of Borromini's drawings, it is possible to trace the evolution of the ground plan of S. Carlo from a straightforward oval on the long axis of the church, of the type which had been introduced into Rome in the late 16th century by Giacomo Vignola and others, to the present, extraordinarily complex series of curves and countercurves. In its final form the plan creates an undulating movement, so that all the walls of the church, both at ground level and at cornice level, seem to be in motion. What is more, the plan is not quite the same at ground level as it is at the cornice. Above the cornice there is an extraordinarily complicated transition, from quadrant arcs, via spandrels containing not-quite-circular roundels, to the simple elliptical shape of the dome, which in turn is complicated by an unusual pattern of coffering, based on octagons and the cross-shaped emblem of the Spanish order for whom the church was built.
Borromini's next major work, the Oratory of S. Filippo Neri, begun in 1637 for the Congregation of the Oratory, is much less daring in plan than S. Carlo, though the facade breaks new ground by receding in a shallow concave curve. The introduction of movement into the facade reached its highest point in Borromini's later works, such as the facades of S. Agnese (1652) and S. Carlo alle Quattro Fontane.
The facade of S. Carlo has a very marked concave-convex-concave movement in the lower story, but in the upper story Borromini introduced a small semicircular pavilion, above which he placed a large oval supported by angels. The pavilion follows the convex curve of the entablature below it, but the oval is mounted on an inward-curving wall, so that the rhythm of the upper part changes to concave-concave-concave before our eyes. This extreme complexity found little favor in Rome, where many people criticized Borromini's "extravagances, " but this daring and lively treatment of a facade, which exploits the brilliant light and shadow of a hot climate, was much appreciated by architects in Spain, Portugal, and Latin America, and, slightly later, in Catholic Germany and Austria.
In 1642 Borromini began the church of S. Ivo alla Sapienza, the university chapel (the Sapienza was the University of Rome). The church was built at one end of an existing courtyard, which Borromini used to provide a concave facade two stories high, repeating the double arcades of the court. The plan of S. Ivo is even more complex than that of S. Carlo. It consists basically of an equilateral triangle with a deep apse in the middle of each side and with the points of the triangle cut off and rounded into curves going in the opposite direction to the apses. Many attempts have been made to explain this shape as symbolic - one of the most popular is that it represents the bee in the arms of the Barberini family - but it seems more likely that it resulted from Borromini's passion for geometry. The walls of S. Ivo are articulated by pilasters which carry a strongly emphasized cornice, which (like that of S. Carlo) defines a plan not quite identical with the ground plan. Above the cornice the whole extraordinary shape is gathered together into something which internally becomes a dome and lantern but externally has a totally different appearance. It can best be described as a convex-curved drum with a shallow tiled roof and a lantern that ends in a spiral ramp.
Even late in his life, Borromini’s innovations continued to be as energetic and radical as ever. For the Re Magi chapel in the Collegio di Propaganda Fide, on which he worked until his death, he designed six pairs of colossal pilasters to define a generally rectangular space with bevelled corners.
In the 1660s, Borromini’s fortunes tragically declined. He was increasingly frustrated by the fame and success of his rival, Bernini. Suffering severe melancholia, he travelled to Lombardy, but when he returned to Rome his melancholy returned to him, and he spent whole weeks without ever leaving his house. Borromini burned all of his drawings in his possession. Taken ill, his condition was made worse by hypochondriac hallucinations and, when he suffered fits, it was decided that he should be denied all activity so that he might sleep. On a hot summer’s night, unable to rest and forbidden to work, he arose in a fury, found a sword, and fell upon it. Borromini recovered a lucid mind after mortally wounding himself, repented, received the last sacraments of the church, and wrote his will before he died on August 2, 1667.
Francesco Borromini was both melancholic and quick in temper which resulted in him withdrawing from certain jobs.
Francesco Borromini never married and did not have children.