Heir to Raphael's workshop and the leading representative of Mannerism, Giulio Pippi de' Jannuzzi, known as Giulio Romano, created his masterpiece in the Hall of the Giants of Palazzo Te in Mantua: both the vault and the walls of the room are decorated with the depiction of the myth of the Fall of the Giants, taken from Ovid's Metamorphoses.
The scene is captured at the moment when divine vengeance descends from the heavens upon the unfortunate Giants who, from the Greek plain of Phlegra, attempt the futile assault on Mount Olympus by piling Mount Pelion upon Mount Ossa. Through a daring foreshortened perspective, the double, circular vault depicts the throne of Jupiter inside a centrally planned temple; slightly below is Jupiter himself, accompanied by Juno and surrounded by the confused and terrified gods of Olympus (Apollo in his solar chariot, Neptune with his trident, Mars wielding his sword, Cupid armed with bow and arrows, and Venus fleeing), shown holding thunderbolts in his hand as he punishes the rebels. On the walls, the Giants are depicted vainly trying to protect themselves from the world collapsing around them: some are crushed beneath the falling mountain, others are swept away by rushing torrents, while still others are struck down by the collapse of a building; between the large French windows appear Pluto with his bident, the Furies with serpents covering their heads, and the giant Typhon breathing fire (according to mythology, Typhon was imprisoned by Jupiter beneath the island of Sicily and, continuing to move and breathe fire, gave rise to Mount Etna): originally, the scene was made even more dramatic by the glow of the flames from a fireplace built into the wall between the windows, directly beneath this figure.
The masterpiece "Fall of the giants" as known in the english language by Giulio Romano portrays the moment Jupiter and the Olympian gods puts back the rebellious Giants back to earth and Giulio through his painting has bring this live to his viewers so much that every cornice and pilaster so the painted rubble seems to spill straight into the room itself, and early visitors apparently found it genuinely dizzying to stand in, some accounts even mentioning people feeling faintly sick or afraid the ceiling was coming down, which tells you the illusion was working exactly as intended. Art historians like Frederick Hartt and Ernst Gombrich have regarded this as a turning point away from the calm, measured classicism of the High Renaissance toward something more theatrical and psychologically aggressive. But beyond the politics and the art-historical framing the most striking part is the physical aspect of the painting it feels less like looking at a painting and more like being caught inside someone's nightmare, the reason it still captures peoples attention.
