Ex Voto: An Account of the Sacro Monte or New Jerusalem at Varallo-Sesia: With Some Notice of Tabachetti's Remaining Work at the Sanctuary of CreaButler, Samuel
Religion
Ex Voto: An Account of the Sacro Monte or New Jerusalem at Varallo-Sesia: With Some Notice of Tabachetti's Remaining Work at the Sanctuary of Crea
Butler, Samuel
Art -- Italy -- Varallo-Sesia; Sacro Monte di Varallo (Sanctuary); Tabaguet, Jean Baptiste, 1568 -1615
Fassola says that this chapel was erected at the expense of Pomponio
Bosso, a noble Milanese, between the years 1560 and 1580. It is
mentioned as finished in the 1586 edition of Caccia, and was probably
completed before Tabachetti came. Bordiga only says that it was finished
in 1582. The statues are of little or no merit, nor yet the frescoes. I
observe that in Caccia the “tempio” is praised but not apparently the
work that it contained. The terra-cotta figures are ascribed by Bordiga
to Ravello, and the frescoes to Testa, whose brother, Lorenzo Testa, was
Fabbriciere at the time the chapel was erected. There is one rather nice
little man in the left-hand corner, but there is nothing else.
CHAPEL NO. 19. ENTRY INTO JERUSALEM.
The figures in this chapel are ascribed to Giovanni D’Enrico by both
Fassola and Torrotti, an ascription very properly set aside by Bordiga,
without assigned reason, but probably because 1590 is considerably too
early for Giovanni D’Enrico, and there is a document dated May 23, 1590,
showing that the fresco background was then contracted for. The
sculptured figures are mentioned as finished in the 1586 edition of
Caccia, so that D’Enrico could not have done them. They are better than
those in the preceding chapels, but they do not arouse enthusiasm, and
have suffered so much from decay, and from repainting, that it is hardly
fair to form any opinion about them. They probably looked much better
when new. The landscape part of the background is by one of the brothers
Rovere, named, as I have said, Fiamenghini, and he has introduced a house
with a stepped gable like those at Antwerp. Some of the figures in the
background appear to be by the painter Testa, who is named in the
document above referred to.
CHAPEL NO. 20. THE LAST SUPPER.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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