The Age of Grandeur: Baroque Art and Architecture

New York: Grove Press, Inc., 1960 Book. Near Fine. Hardcover. First English Edition. Small 4to. xvii (i), 305 pp, list of 195 b&w illustrations and 8 color plates, introduction, I. The Birth of Baroque; II. Roma Triumphans; III. Bernini and Borromini; IV. The Reception of Baroque; V. France Between Baroque and Classicism; VI. Bernini Visits Paris; VII. Classicism and French Baroque; VIII. England; IX. Central Europe; X. Imperial Baroque; XI. Baroque in Poland and Russia; XII. Colonial Baroque; conclusion, notes, bibliography, index. Translated from the French by A. Ross Williamson: First Printing, 1960. "In the preface to the French edition the author expressed the hope of doing something to dispel those prejudices which have made the great Baroque masterpieces incomprehensible to French taste. These prejudices most certainly did not exist in the seventeenth century, when Italian art enjoyed great prestige in France. But France, especially the cultivated circles of the capital, did not unreservedly submit to the Italian models. It sought for a personal idiom to express its manner of life and thought, and finally found it in Classicism." from the Introduction. Only the faintest edge wear, else, Pristine. Clean, tight and strong binding with no underlining, highlighting or marginalia. Dark-red cloth with black title plate and gilt lettering to spine..