LA FONTANA DEL MORO di Bernini, Piazza Navona

Speranza

Uno dei quattro tritoni della “Fontana del Moro”

Il ”Moro”

AFTER the FONTANA DEI QUATTRO FIUMI, di Bernini, was unveiled, attention veered towards the SMALLER fountain at the SOUTH END of the PIAZZA NAVONA.

Designed in the late CINQUECENTO by GIACOMO DELLA PORTA, the fountain was roughly octogonal in form, with SEMI-CIRCULAR projections filled by  sculptured TRITONI on the FOUR main sides.

We learn from a drawing that BERNINI at one time considered reshaping it with a CIRCULAR BASIN like that of the large fountain, and resiting the four tritons so that they corresponded with the four rivers and were no longer set axially to the square.

BUT, for a variety of reasons, this scheme was not proceded.

BERNINI was allowed to do no more than supply the EXISTING fountain with a NEW CENTRAL element.

The first proposal was for the PAPAL INSIGNIA elevated in the centre of the fountain on a SHELL, but before long this was replaced by a design derived from the FONTANA DEL TRITONE, which showed a large shell raised vertically on the intertwined tails of three dolphins, with water CASCADING from the top.

THIS design was carriet out in MARBLE -- LA LUMACA DI MARMO RETTA DA TRE PESCI -- and the shell was placed in the centre of the fountain.

To the Pope's eyes it appeared TOO SMALL, and BERNINI was instructed to substitute a STATUE.

BERNINI thereupon worked up a new scheme, recorded both in a drawing and a terracotta model, in which the FISH from the base of the EARLIER design were supported on the shoulders of TWO TRITONS with their TAILS waving in the air.

BUT THIS too failed to meet the Pope's requirements, and was replaced by a plan for a FLAT SHELL raised by DOLPHINS with A LARGE NETTUNO standing on the TOP.

The objection to this solution was that it did NOTHING to correct, and may even have tended to EXAGGERATE, the rigid symmetry of DELLA PORTA's scheme.

This danger was ELIMINATED in the FOURTH and final design, where a SHELL developed from the second project forms A PLATFORM for the CENTRAL FIGURE which is posed in such a way as to invest the static basin with the illusion of CIRCULARITY.

A conceit from the THIRD scheme is preserved in the FISH writhing between the triton's legs and ejaculating water from its mouth.

BERNINI's concern is once more with INSTABILITY, communicated in this case by the PRECARIOUS balance of the SHELL, the fish lifted from the waters of the pool, and the ANIMATED FIGURE of the sea-god revolving on its own axis with superhuman force.