Former chapel of St. Ignatius, Bologna
The Glory of St. Ignatius; The staircase of the Pinacoteca Nazionale of Bologna
Bologna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy
c. 1660–1675
Giuseppe Barbieri (painter) documented in Bologna from 1672 as a Jesuit novice and in 1675 mentioned as pictor
Religious architecture (chapel)
The Jesuits Fathers of Bologna
In the seventeenth-century the Jesuits decided to build a novitiate in Bologna. On the 11th of May in 1627 they bought a whole block of houses in via Belle Arti. In 1660, after long discussions about the utility of a novitiate in Bologna, the work finally started. The chapel of the novitiate of St. Ignatius was created for private worship, especially for the prayers of the novices. In the past its decorations have been attributed to father Pozzo himself, the celebrated Jesuit artist who painted some of the most extraordinary baroque frescoes for his religious order.
Architect Leone Pancaldi led the refurbishing of the Pinacoteca Nazionale, between 1957 and 1973. At that time the ex-novitiate chapel on the upper floor housed eighteenth-century Bolognese paintings. It was enlarged by breaking the floor and became the museum's main entrance with the stairway leading to the first floor. The original trompe- l’oeil ceiling with the glory of the saint was thus emphasized.
The decoration of the chapel of the ex-novitiate of the Jesuits of Bologna, was likely painted around 1675 by the Jesuit painter Francesco Barbieri. It was inspired by the famous illusive decorations painted by Andrea Pozzo. Barbieri, starting from models by Pozzo, develops an illusory architecture that is a sort of prosecution of the real one, typical of the mature baroque language. The work of the Jesuit painter shows a strong ideal basis: the glory of the saint, taken to heaven by the angels, is a clear self-celebration of the powerful religious order founded by him. The monogram of the Jesuits is painted on one of the short sides of the architecture, above an illusive balcony and is lifted by two angels. Barbieri is not Andrea Pozzo and the painting shows less dramatic movement of the figures, and the colours are less vibrant. He lacks the impressionistic touch and the virtuoso movement of his master. Barbieri tends to simplification perhaps because of his young age or his still developing skills. At this time, he is just one of the many careful pupils of a great master.
A letter of Andrea Pozzo to the Rector of the College of Mondovì shows evidence that there was a real contact between Pozzo and Barbieri. In particular in 1693 for the painted architecture of San Bartolomeo in Modena, Barbieri used Pozzo's Perspectiva Pictorum et Architectorum and possibly even some of his drawings. The glory of St. Ignatius painted by Barbieri on the vault of the chapel of the novitiate of Bologna in 1675 is strongly influenced by Pozzo's ceiling decorations.
The chapel was built on the east wing of the Jesuit novitiate in 1660, in 1803 it became part of the Academy of Fine Arts of Bologna and in 1882 was made into the present Pinacoteca Nazionale by Royal decree. The Jesuit Giuseppe Barbieri, a pupil of father Andrea Pozzo, soon decorated the ceiling quoting his master’s Roman frescoes. There are in fact many affinities with the decoration of St. Ignatius in Rome, where Pozzo celebrated the heavenly glory of the saint through a hardy perspective, opened inside an illusive painted architecture.
Bibliography and historical documents.
Baroncelli, F., “L'architettura dipinta di Fratel Giuseppe Barberi”, L'Arte degli Estensi: La pittura del Seicento e del Settecento a Modena e Reggio, Bologna (exhibition catalogue), Venice, 1986, pp. 54-58.
Dall'isola alla città: i Gesuiti a Bologna (eds. G. P. Brizzi and A. M. Matteucci), Bologna, 1988.
“La Pinacoteca Nazionale”, L'arte, un universo di relazioni (eds. A. Emiliani and M. Scolaro), Bologna, 2002.
Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna. Catalogo Generale (eds. J.Bentini, G. P. Cammarota, D. Scaglietti Kelescian), I, Dal Duecento a Francesco Francia, Venice, 2004, pp. 26-28.
Copyright images: Archivio fotografico della Soprintendenza per il Patrimonio storico artistico di Bologna, su concessione del Ministero per i Beni culturali.
Paolo Cova "Former chapel of St. Ignatius, Bologna" in "Discover Baroque Art", Museum With No Frontiers, 2024. https://baroqueart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=monument;BAR;it;Mon12;15;en
Prepared by: Paolo CovaPaolo Cova
SURNAME: Cova
NAME: Paolo
AFFILIATION:
TITLE: Art Histiorian
CV: Graduated in DAMS at the University of Bologna, is specializing in History of Art at the same university. At present he is collaborating with the Musei Civici d’Arte Antica of Bologna.
He has collaborated to some exhibitions on contemporary and medieval art. His interests are about museography and Medieval, Modern and Contemporary art.
Translation by: Antonella MampieriAntonella Mampieri
SURNAME: Mampieri
NAME: Antonella
AFFILIATION: Musei Civici d’Arte Antica, Bologna
TITLE: Art Hitorian
CV:
Graduated and specialised at the University of Bologna. She is a specialist in Bolognese late Baroque art, namely sculpture. Among other subjects she has been studying nineteenth-century funerary art in the Bologna monumental cemetery, la Certosa.
Translation copyedited by: Lisa Kelman
MWNF Working Number: IT2 19