Exhibition organised by the Spanish National Library, with the collaboration of Fundación Banco Santander and Fundación COAM.
Coinciding with the study, restoration and publication of the Spanish National Library's reasoned catalogue of Architectural and Ornamental Drawings of the 18th Century, a representative and selective exhibition of the enormous richness of said drawing collections will be held.
The exhibition will include some of the most beautiful architectural drawings, projects, sketches and notes that will help to explain the culture of the architects of the time and their understanding of the idea and practice of their profession, basically the work of Spanish, Italian and French architects and artists.
In addition to isolated drawings, resulting from projects or elevations and views of existing buildings and cities, albums containing drawings of a different nature will also be displayed, which will help to explain the different forms of use and the architect's relationship with such a decisive instrument of discipline as graphical representation. Therefore, albums will be displayed representing characteristic sequences of the restitution of classical buildings in academic culture, while on other occasions drawing books are understood as a memoir journal about training trips or stays in places such as Rome or Naples, of great importance in the era of the Grand Tour par excellence. There are also drawing books which represent a collection of different projects and sketches made by a single architect throughout his years of activity, even including drawings of other close or simply admired colleagues. An exemplary case, in this regard, is the factitious album of Silvestre Pérez.
This rich drawing typology preserved by the Spanish National Library also includes drawings resulting from the binding of a specific project (floor plans, elevations, cross-sections, details, etc.) or those which served to prepare editions of vignettes of festivals and other temporary events, without forgetting the genre of architecture and fortification treatises.
The culture of 18th century architects, general and broad in nature, is represented throughout the exhibition through drawing instruments and engraved portraits of the most relevant architects of the time, in addition to a small collection of the most frequently used treatises and collections of architectural prints at the time.