Bernini's Total Vision

Why did Bernini think in whole spaces instead of single statues? Because he was also a man of the theater.

He wrote plays, directed them, and built the stage sets and machines — including effects that made fire and floods look real to a live audience. He carried those tricks into stone. Lighting, sightlines, the viewer's path through a chapel: he planned them like a director planning a scene, so the visitor doesn't just see the art. They walk into it.