European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 1, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse                                My Chi Hii t  Yav v the Villa Cornaro in Piombino is one of Andrea Palladio s creations. A amps Dav Cseythe Small cities of Palladio today a visitors can View the architecture designed for the Renaissance Man by j. King Cruger. Northern Italy Bureau _ How fortunate we Are that in the 16th Century the fat cats of Venice turned their backs on the sea. That dramatic about face prompted by a sink in sea Trade in the vast area controlled by the venetian Empire caused the venetians to exploit the Fertility of their hinterlands the Veneto. That exploitation primed an explosion in Renaissance architecture whose aftershocks continue to rumble on. The Plains of the Veneto an area encompassing Treviso Padua Vicenza and Verona Are strewn with Vilos of varying degrees of grandeur and from various periods. The most influential although admittedly smaller and plainer than their followers were the work of a. Genius named Andrea Palladio. A House is Quot nothing other than a Small City Palladio wrote in his Quattro Libri four books on architecture. Over the next two centuries Quot Small cities Quot flourished All Over the Veneto and its neighbouring Region Friuli Venezia. Giulia their interiors decorated by the likes of Veronese Tiepolo and Tutor Etc. _ _ today in areas of northeastern Italy easily reached from Aviano a and even handier to Vicenza Are almost 4,000 so called palladian Villas Many of them in ruins some restored and it about 150 open to Public View. Palladio and his contemporaries Jacopo Sansovini and the Brothers Camozzi at their height produced probably the finest examples of How Man should abide with nature in an agricultural environment. Their farmhouse Villas softly blended with their bucolic surroundings and were flanked on either Side with porticoes where farm equipment and livestock were housed. From his studies in Rome where he was seduced by the stateliness and proportions of the buildings that remained from Antiquity Palladio adopted the principles of roman architecture to his times. The ancient roots of his inspiration Are much in. Evidence in Palladio s creations Venice s churches of the Redentore and san Giorgio Maggiore Vicenza s Teatro Olimpich and Villa Rotonda plus Many other Villas still standing in Northern Italy most in the Vicenza area where Palladio did most of his great work. The Villa Rotonda is Palladio s Best known and Best loved Villa. It seems to epitomize the palladian Ideal of neoclassical Grace with its quartet of pillar fronted facades Complete with cupola. Palladio s influence grew even greater after his death in 1580. Palladian architecture had such notable followers As the englishmen Inigo Jones and sir Christopher Wren and the French architects of Louis Xiv and Louis Xiv. His influence reached America most stunningly in Thomas continued on Page 4 of a y <5<. A a. Quot a. I a to p f it i i ijm1 Elm Illi ill the m Liml 11 in s  ii a a the Basilica palladian in Piazza Dei Signori in the heart of Vicenza is one of Palladio s most impressive Villas. File september 1, 1994 stripes Magazine