MASSARI, GIORGIO. — Architect, born in Venice around 1686, died there in 1766. He was formed in the Venetian milieu of the early eighteenth century, when, following Longhena’s death, Tirali was initiating a decisive return to Palladio, albeit through the equivocation of Scamozzian academicism.
Massari reveals the influence of Scamozzi, Longhena’s first master, in the Grassi-Stucky Palace on the Grand Canal; at other times, more felicitously, he approaches Palladio, not so much to derive from him an inert abstract rule as a measure of assured balance, with which to temper the deplored excesses of the seventeenth century. A certain graceful refinement, a fluid movement of planes still « roco cò », despite the evident rationalistic clarity, produce a sober and restrained elegance, equally remote from the emphasis of the Longhenians and from neoclassical coldness.
Works: c. 1720: Pola Palace at Barcon; 1727: work on the Hospice of the Catechumens (Venice); c. 1730: renovated hall in the Scuola di S. Giovanni Evangelista (Venice); c. 1735: S. Antonio (Udine); c. 1736: I Gesuati (Venice); 1728–36: S. Marcuola (Venice); 1745: La Pietà (Venice); 1720–46: Church of Peace (Brescia); 1750: Altar of the Blessed Sacrament (Padua, Cathedral), already begun by G. Gloria; 1750–53: Main chapel of the church of the Fava (Venice); 1754: completion of the Rezzonico Palace; 1763: Chapel of the Crucifix (Abbey of Curzola); 1730–64: Main chapel of the church of the Oratorians (Vicenza). Attributed works: Venice: arrangement of the Orologio–Gradenigo Palace complex (Rio Marin), Tiepolo Palace (Campo S. Polo), Civran Palace (Grand Canal), S. Giovanni in Oleo (c. 1762), Le Penitenti (1763).