BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

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French

     Praised by Georges de Scudéry and François de Malherbe, Daniel Rabel (1578-1637) was renowned as a draftsman, engraver and engineer. He was known for his drawings inspired by the ballets at Louis XIII’s court, he illuminated the Bible, made drawings based on antique vases, published a book on the arms of Germany, and drew the flower collection of the pasha of Istanbul. Although his influence on the history of early modern French gardens is still not well known, it was nonetheless confirmed by the publication of a magnificent anthology, the Theatrum florae (1622), and an ensemble of designs of parterres, the Livre de differants desseigns de parterres (1630) printed by Melchior Tavernier, the publisher of Le Muet, Francine and Vignola.
Rabel worked in the domaine of “portraiture” in the way that Jacques Androuet du Cerceau did in presenting his creations to princes, such as Charles de Gonzague and Gaston d’Orléans, in order to obtain missions and support. Moreover, he evokes his elder in the prologue to the Livre de differants desseigns de parterres to assert that in comparison his hitherto unpublished designs are less “coarse”. In fact, his series is really innovative, because it contains the celebrated “Embroidery parterres” before they were illustrated in the Traité du jardinage (1638) by Jacques Boyceau de la Barauderie and described by Claude I Mollet in the Theatre et plans de jardinage (1652).
Most of the compositions in this series are based on four squares, with others shaped as oblongs. It consists of twenty-one models, all embellished with bundles of vines and foliage. Rabel’s “embroideries and other delicacies” , characterized by a light drawing style, simple line drawings with no shading, are divided into diverse branches terminating in scrolls. They are obtained through the enlargement in “grands volumes” of details and rythms of an astonishing profusion of vegetal organs. A certain resemblance exists between these embroideries and the modules for grotesque decors embellished with foliage of Sebastiano Serlio’s Quarto libro (1537). In fact it seems that the dimensions and graphic complexity of the ornaments in the architect from Bologna were amplified to transfer them to the garden, to satisfy a taste for architectural hubris.

Laurent Paya (Cesr, Tours/Artopos, Jardin et Paysage, Montpellier) – 2012

Critical bibliography

D. Guilmard, Les maîtres ornemanistes, dessinateurs, peintres, architectes, sculpteurs et graveurs, Paris, Plon, 1881.

M. Mélo, “Les Rabel” Encyclopedia Universalis (online edition), 2010.

V. Meyer, “L’Œuvre gravé de Daniel Rabel”, Nouvelles de l’estampe, 67, Jan. 1983, pp. 6-15.