# Exterior view [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [RAGUZZINI, Filippo]() - Date: 1701-1750 - Technique: Photo ## Commentary Piazza Sant'Ignazio, surrounded by an ensemble of five residential buildings for the growing administration class of the city, is characterised by its complex interplay of ovoid shapes and the ingenious theatre-wing like construction. People walking from the nearby Piazza di Pietra find themselves suddenly emerging in Piazza San Ignazio into a confrontation with the church, as if they had stumbled in from offstage. Although the decorative effect of the buildings is an important component of their overall effect, the ensemble signifies a departure from the typical operative logic of the anteposed piazza. Raguzzini subtly undermines the supremacy of the church in the church/piazza relationship typical of Counter-Reformation urban planning, and invests the space of the piazza itself with considerable energy and intrigue: in this way, the church has become a pendant to the piazza, rather than the reason for the piazza's existence. View the <a href="\#" onClick="w=window.open \('/support/plans/r/raguzzin/ignazio.html', 'newWin', 'scrollbars=yes,status=no,dependent=yes,screenX=0,screenY=0,width=400,height=600'\);w.opener=this;w.focus\(\);return false">plan</a> of the Piazza San Ignazio, Rome. ## Related artworks - [Exterior view]() - [Exterior view]() - [Exterior view]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()