The Lost Carriage
The “Carriage of the Acorns” (also known as the “Black Velvet Carriage”) was an opulent carriage created between 1657 and 1661 by Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Ercole Ferrata for Cardinal Flavio Chigi. Because of the nature of the materials, most of the carriage has disintegrated, leaving only four screaming-head finials, a gilded frame, and a gilded adornment featuring cherubs and Baroque ribbon motifs as physical evidence that this carriage existed.
The sole remaining image of the carriage is found in a painting titled “Piazza Navona Fountains” by Roman artist Filippo Gagliardi.
From the outset of his career, Bernini was drawn to exaggerated open-mouthed grotesques, with his first work, “The Damned Soul” (1619), created at just 20 years old. Between 1650 and 1655, he cast screaming heads for both his personal carriage and Cardinal Flavio’s carriage.
The remaining carriage ornamentation, now displayed at the Palazzo Chigi, were extensively photographed and scanned using lidar technology. These files enabled the digital recreation and 3D printing of the ornamentation.
Following the digital development and 3D printing of the ornamentation, efforts began to reconstruct the entire carriage in the digital realm. An initial image was AI-generated to envision what the carriage might have looked like if preserved in a museum. The process of building a full 3D model involved extensive research and multiple iterations but resulted in a full-scale digital recreation of the carriage.
Subsequently, experimentation with geo-locating the digital model in augmented reality commenced. Challenges included accurately positioning the model along the X, Y, and Z axes, requiring physical presence at the site to verify that the carriage was correctly placed and not floating. While this was manageable in locations such as the university campus, it proved challenging when attempting to geo-locate in front of the Palazzo Chigi, ensuring the carriage was positioned as it might have been in the 1600s.
To learn more about the Chigi family and Palazzo Chigi, click here.
