ABSTRACT
Art history defines the capriccio as a pictorial genre dedicated to an imaginary composition where various architecture and landscape elements cohabit in a fictive setting. Whether real or invented, these elements are lifted from different cultural, historic and geographic contexts; nothing predisposes them to be assembled together in an innovative “unity of place.” The powerful originality of the capriccio derives from this deliberately artificial and intellectual reframing which creates an inventive and theatrical re-composition of a “second degree reality.” It creates an even more intriguing and thrilling appeal to our senses and mind because of its exquisite ambiguity achieved through pictorial realism. This manner of cultural creation reveals, however, a split personality: the specific know-how of the architectural capriccio emerges as a head of Janus with two contrasting faces and two distinct operational modes: pictorial fiction or urban reality.
