Name of Monument:

Church of the Gesù, painted architecture of the high altar

Location:

Frascati, Rome, Latium, Italy

Date:

1699–1700

Artists:

Andrea Pozzo (1642, Trento – 1709, Vienna) with the help of his Jesuit pupil, Antonio Colli (died, Rome, 1723)

Denomination / Type of monument:

Religious architecture, church

History:

The Church of the Gesù, now found right in the centre of the city on account of gradual urban expansion, dates back to the late 16th–17th/early 17th­–18th centuries, although there were Jesuits in the city from 1559. The church was expanded to its current form with the support of Olimpia Aldobrandini Pamphili, after her death in 1681 (between 1696 and 1700), according to the traditional Jesuit model already used in the Roman churches of the Gesù, Sant’Ignazio and Vallicella.

Description:

The church, based on a design in the Counter-Reformist style, has a wide nave with chapels that are intended to harmoniously combine the practical needs of preaching (larger spaces) with a sober, strict feel.
Also for practical—as well as didactic—ends, the Jesuit Padre Andrea Pozzo created an illusory extension to the church, creating a prolongation of the choir behind the altar that contains a mock shrine modelled on Bernini's baldachin in St Peter's, and behind which there is a scene from the Circumcision of Jesus. The central space in front of the altar is covered by a mock cupola painted in perspective. It employs the solution used in Rome at Sant'Ignazio, but with greater sobriety in its architectural simplicity, and entirely free of figures. The artist's great skill and masterful perspective work are evident in the transitions, apparently forming a harmonious whole, between the real architecture of the nave and the mock pilasters and columns surmounted by capitals and trabeations in the painted area behind the altar. It should be noted that this use of painted perspective – undoubtedly dictated by economic need – at the time also assumed a symbolic significance inasmuch as true spiritual reality was sought beyond sometimes misleading appearances, to such an extent that the focal point enabling the illusion to be best appreciated is marked on the floor by a black disk, stressing—as confirmed by Padre Pozzo himself in his treatise Perspectiva pictorum et architectorum (1693)—that there is only "one position to which the believer should strive".

For practical—as well as didactic—ends, the Jesuit Padre Andrea Pozzo painted a decorative scene that is one of the masterpieces of Baroque illusionistic art. A shortage of economic resources prompted the artist to create an illusory extension of the space in the church, creating a prolongation of the choir behind the high altar that contains a mock shrine, which stands before a representation of the Circumcision of Jesus.

How Monument was dated:

Tantillo, A.M., "Chiesa del Gesù", I principi della chiesa, Milan, 1998.

Selected bibliography:

Pipita, G., La chiesa del Gesù a Frascati: pitture di Andrea Pozzo, Frascati 1995.
Tantillo, A. M., "Chiesa del Gesù", I principi della chiesa, Milan 1998, pp. 100–101.
"Colli Antonio", SAUR Allgemeines Kuenstler-Lexikon, 20, Munich-Leipzig 1998, p. 296.

Citation of this web page:

Laura Indrio "Church of the Gesù, painted architecture of the high altar" in "Discover Baroque Art", Museum With No Frontiers, 2025.
https://baroqueart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=monument;BAR;it;Mon13;2;en

Prepared by: Laura Indrio
Translation by: Laurence Nunny
Translation copyedited by: Mandi GomezMandi Gomez

Amanda Gomez is a freelance copy-editor and proofreader working in London. She studied Art History and Literature at Essex University (1986–89) and received her MA (Area Studies Africa: Art, Literature, African Thought) from SOAS in 1990. She worked as an editorial assistant for the independent publisher Bellew Publishing (1991–94) and studied at Bookhouse and the London College of Printing on day release. She was publications officer at the Museum of London until 2000 and then took a role at Art Books International, where she worked on projects for independent publishers and arts institutions that included MWNF’s English-language editions of the books series Islamic Art in the Mediterranean. She was part of the editorial team for further MWNF iterations: Discover Islamic Art in the Mediterranean Virtual Museum and the illustrated volume Discover Islamic Art in the Mediterranean.

True to its ethos of connecting people through the arts, MWNF has provided Amanda with valuable opportunities for discovery and learning, increased her editorial experience, and connected her with publishers and institutions all over the world. More recently, the projects she has worked on include MWNF’s Sharing History Virtual Museum and Exhibition series, Vitra Design Museum’s Victor Papanek and Objects of Desire, and Haus der Kulturen der Welt’s online publication 2 or 3 Tigers and its volume Race, Nation, Class.

MWNF Working Number: IT1 02