See Rome’s Most Beautiful Rotundas

There is something particularly captivating about artistic beauty that hovers above you. Almost celestial in nature, it causes you to look up in wonder and discover its magnificence. A stunning new book featuring domed interiors shot by German photographer Jakob Straub offers you the same visual feast—it’s just a bit easier on the neck.

From 2007 to 2011, Straub took photographs of decorative rotunda ceilings in churches and former holy spaces throughout Rome using a medium-format analogue camera. More concerned with distilling the religious architecture back to the idea behind its design, Straub shot the images from the same angle every time, but varied the exposure times. Then he digitally processed individual sections of the photographs to create a new, flattened perspective of each dome.

This process erases the differences in scale, building material, and time (many of the domes were built centuries apart), allowing one to focus on the underlying design. Out this month, Roma Rotunda (Hatje Cantz; $60) presents 36 sacred rotundas—dusted in gold, illuminated with tiny geometric glass windows, or emblazoned with colorful religious iconography—contained within a 50-foot-long accordion fold.

Click here to see a selection of Straub's photographs of rotundas.