The influence of the Enlightenment on western architecture
2011级英语一班 马佳 学号：201152010111
pulleysThe background
  The Age of Enlightenment (or simply the Enlightenment or Age of Reason) was a cultural movement of intellectuals beginning in the late 17th- and 18th-century Europe emphasizing reason and individualism rather than tradition.Its purpose was to reform society using reason, challenge ideas grounded in tradition and faith, and advance knowledge through the scientific method.It promoted scientific thought,skepticism,and intellectual interchange.It opposed superstition and intolerance, with the Catholic Church a favorite target.Some Enlightenment philosophes collaborated with Enlightened despots,who were absolute rulers who tried out some of the new governmental ideas in practice. The ideas of the Enlightenment have had a long-term major impact on the culture, politics, and governments of the Western world.
  Originating about 1650 to 1700, it was sparked by philosophers Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677), John Locke (1632–1704), Pierre Bayle (1647–1706), Voltaire (1694–1778) and physicist Isaac Newton (1643–1727).Ruling princes often endorsed and fostered these figures and even attempted to apply their ideas of government in what was known as enlightened absolutism. The Scientific Revolution is closely tied to the Enlightenment, as its discoveries overturned many traditional concepts and introduced new perspectives on nature and man's place within it. The Enlightenment flourished until about 1790–1800, after which the emphasis on reason gave way to Romanticism's emphasis on emotion, and a Counter-Enlightenment gained force.
The Enlightenment Assertion
The Enlightenment thinkers strongly criticized the feudal autocratic system and the spiritual pillar — the Catholic Church, described the future blueprint of "rational kingdom", provided the ideological and theoretical preparation of achievement dominance for the bourgeoisie. In France, the Enlightenment  disclosed the feudal system deeply, and did sufficient prepar
ation for the upcoming the French Revolution. After that, the Enlightenment had been spread to other parts of the world to enlighten people's thoughts and shake the feudal rule.In general,the ideological principles,what advocated by the Enlightenment ideologists,including Natural Rights,tripartite political system,freedom,equality,democracy and legality,had been widely spread.These formed a strong social ethos that shook the foundation of the feudal rule, promoted the development of capitalism,as well as promoted the social progress. Subsequently, many works of the Enlightenment ideologists had also been introduced to Asian countries such as China and Japan, that inspired those person of noble aspirations to struggle for the transformation of the old society.
Meanwhile,the principles that had been promoted by the Enlightenment --- natural rights,freedom and equality, democratic,had brought vitality to the western architecture. There was the neoclassicism in the corresponding period with the Enlightenment , after that,there also were schools of romanticism, eclecticism, organic, modernism and so on.This period could be called a hundred flowers in bloom. Comparing with the Enlightenment’s previous architectural styles, we clearly see the influence of Western Enlig
htenment on architecture.It made the architecture of the western styles become more diversified and closer to the lives of the ordinary people.
Different architectural styles and features in different periods
Before, I will divide the Enlightenment period into two aspects to introduce different architectural styles and features of different periods.
1.The early Enlightenment-- the Baroque style
  The Baroque is a period of artistic style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, architecture, literature, dance, and music. The style began around 1600 in Rome, Italy and spread to most of Europe.The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Roman Catholic Church, which had decided at the time of the Council of Trent, in response to the Protestant Reformation, that the arts should communicate religious themes in direct and emotional involvement.The aristocracy also saw the dramatic
style of Baroque architecture and art as a means of impressing visitors and expressing triumph, power and control. Baroque palaces are built around an entrance of courts, grand staircases and reception rooms of sequentially increasing opulence.
  In Baroque architecture, new emphasis was placed on bold massing, colonnades, domes, light-and-shade (chiaroscuro), 'painterly' color effects, and the bold play of volume and void. In interiors, Baroque movement around and through a void informed monumental staircases that had no parallel in previous architecture. The other Baroque innovation in worldly interiors was the state apartment, a sequence of increasingly rich interiors that culminated in a presence chamber or throne room or a state bedroom. The sequence of monumental stairs followed by a state apartment was copied in smaller scale everywhere in aristocratic dwellings of any pretensions.
  Baroque architecture was taken up with enthusiasm in central Germany , Austria and Russia .In England the culmination of Baroque architecture was embodied in work by Sir Christopher Wren, Sir John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor, from ca. 1660 to ca. 1725.
Many examples of Baroque architecture and town planning are found in other European towns, and in Latin America. Town planning of this period featured radiating avenues intersecting in squares, which took cues from Baroque garden plans. In Sicily, Baroque developed new shapes and themes as in Noto, Ragusa and Acireale "Basilica di San Sebastiano".

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