Excerpt from The Etchings of Piranesi
Giambattista Piranesi was born at Venice in 1720, and died at Rome in 1778.
His tomb is in the Church of St. Mary on the Aventine, which once belonged to the Priory of the Knights of St. John. There is there a statue of some merit which commemorates him, and the fact that he, as architect, restored and decorated that Church ten years or more before his death. He also restored the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo, which everybody visits in Rome on account of its superb monuments of the Renaissance ; and his work as architect in the interior of this Church, at least, is not without some merit in a conventional and academical way. This, however, is of little account. Piranesi is known now in one way only, and in that way is not half so well known as he should be. His big etchings of architectural subjects arc too big for collectors to enjoy heartily. Your true collector is a man of minute and delicate little refinements and subtile distinctions in his tastes and in his ways, and Piranesi's works are big and bold.
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