Francesco Galli Bibiena

[1] He worked successively for the Emperors Leopold I and Joseph I, and was invited to Madrid by Philip V, who appointed him his principal architect.

[2] The large theatre was known as the Große Komödiensaal ("Grand Hall of Comedies"), which later became the Court Theater (Burgtheater).

The Hoftheater's architecture greatly influenced theatre design in Germany and Austria throughout the first half of the eighteenth century.

[2] After a short stay in Italy and in Lorraine, he was invited by Emperor Joseph I, back to the Hofburg, to work as the "First Theatrical Engineer" and as a scene-painter/decorator from 1709 to 1712.

[1] Although his father, Giovanni Galli da Bibiena, had a distinguished career, it was Francesco and his older brother Ferdinando that established the family's artistic reputation and its fortune.