Bramante's 'Mirabile Artificio' in Milan

The Milanese church of Santa Maria presso San Satiro shows a successful integration between architecture and perspective. The solid perspective of the choir simulates a depth that is comparable to the transept’s lenght. The effectiveness of the projective deception demonstrates the high level of local perspective science and justifies the search for the perspective variables by the comparison of previous hypotheses, with the help of an adequate architectural survey of the vision trick in the real space of the church. The research bases on the three-dimensional reconstruction of the interior space of the Bramante’s virtual architecture. Starting from an wider survey campaign, which integrated traditional methodologies with laser scanning, the point of view was detected through the digital simulation of the imaginary space of Bramante’s concept. The assembly of the 24 point clouds and their reworking in a mesh surface verified the strictness of the construction, but some anomalies that are hidden by the ornamental apparatus, which make uncertain positioning of the point of view, such as some plant asymmetries and the offset of the choir with respect to the nave axis. The virtual reconstruction highlights a new point of view. It differs from previous theoretical hypothesis but explains the design that identifies the solid perspective of this church as the first model of modern theatrical scenography.