Landi was born in
Bologna. He was a pupil of
Ferdinando Galli-Bibiena, and was received as an Academician of Bologna, where he was professor of architecture and perspective. Landi accepted a position as a draftsman for an expedition demarcating Portuguese territories in the
North Region of Brazil under Dom
João V. He left Bologna at the end of 1750 or beginning of 1751, taking a boat in Genoa bound for Lisbon. Landi stayed in Portugal for two years at the beginning of the reign of Dom
José I of Portugal. Landi left for Pará on June 2, 1753, with other members of the technical commission. The commission stayed in Belém for a year before moving up to the upper
Rio Negro, the theater of future operations. At the time of his arrival
Francisco Xavier de Mendonça Furtado was governor and captain general of the
Captaincy of Grão-Pará; Furtado was also the brother of the
Count of Oeiras,
Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, 1st Marquis of Pombal. Landi acted as an amateur naturalist, drawing for the first time the Amazonian flora and fauna. He settled in Belém and became a member of the
Third Order of Saint Francis, a membership restricted to European members of wealth and prestige. He conducted further scientific expeditions on the rivers of the North region of Brazil, and became familiar with the indigenous peoples of the Amazon. His manuscript on the natural history of the
Amazon,
Descrizione di varie piante, frutti, animali, passeri, pesci, biscie, rasine, e altre simili cose che si ritrovano in questa Cappitania del Gran Parà (ca. 1775), has been annotated by zoologists
Nelson Papavero,
Dantes Teixeira, and botanist
Paulo Cavalcante and published by the Emilio Goeldi Museum of Pará. Landi is referred to as Antônio José Landi in most Brazilian publications. Landi would become known for the urban plan of the city of Belém and designing or modifying nearly all of the buildings of the period. He outlined facades, buildings, a port, squares and other urban elements. Also according to Leandro Tocantins, "He never represented the abandonment of the cultural values that were part of his personality as a European man and, especially, as an Italian. On the contrary, his presence in Brazil - and in the more tropical Brazil that is the Amazon - meant the introduction of new technical and artistic forms and concepts to the region at that time, and the happy convergence of styles in vogue in Italy and Portugal, without forgetting the intimate correlation between architecture and the environment, a phenomenon that Landi had the sensitivity to perceive." ==Noted works==