Bomb destroys Archiginnasio anatomical theatre

Historic facility hit in 1944 air raid

The Archiginnasio anatomical theatre is surrounded by
statues of eminent physicians carved in wood

The historic anatomical theatre of the Palazzo Archiginnasio, the original seat of the University of Bologna, was almost completely destroyed in a bombing raid on the city by Allied forces on this day in 1944.

The northern Italian city was a frequent target during the final two years of the conflict because of its importance as a transport hub and communications centre.  The wing of the palazzo housing the anatomical theatre, built between 1636 and 1638, took a direct hit on the night of January 29.

Although it is unlikely that the university - the oldest in the world - was a specific target, bombing was much less precise 75 years ago and collateral damage was common and often widespread.

As well as its importance in the history of medical research, the anatomical theatre was notable as an art treasure, mainly for the 18th century carved wooden statues by Silvestro Gianotti depicting great physicians of history, from the Greek physicians Hippocrates and Galenus onwards, including many who worked at the university, such as Fabrizio Bartoletti, Marcello Malpighi, Mondino de Liuzzi and Gaspare Tagliacozzi.

Gaspare Tagliacozzi was one of the many
physicians who worked in the Archiginnasio

The theatre, built in the form if an amphitheatre, was designed in 1637 by the Bolognese architect Antonio Levanti, a pupil of Annibale Carracci.

The ceiling, completed between 1647 and 1649 had the figure of Apollo, the god of Medicine, in the middle, surrounded by symbolic images of constellations carved in wood.

The centrepiece of the table was the white table on which the dissection of human or animal bodies took place.  These were open to the public and took place in the presence of an Inquisition priest.

To the side, in an elevated position, the cattedra del lettore - teacher’s desk - was flanked by two spellati - skinned men - statues, sculpted in 1734 from drawings by Ercole Lelli, a local painter of the late Baroque period who became famous for his anatomical sculptures in wax.

Incredibly, despite the destruction, the theatre was faithfully reconstructed after the war had ended thanks to the painstaking recovery from the rubble of anything that could be reused, including the majority of the statues.

The theatre today is open daily to the public, along with other parts of the Palazzo Archiginnasio, which was the seat of the university until 1803. The original marble table is not the one on display, mainly out of consideration for visitors whose sensitivities might be offended by the sight of indelible blood stains.

The city of Bologna as a whole suffered extensive damage from bombing during the Second World War II. The worst raids took place in 1943. On July 24, a massive bombardment destroyed a significant part of the historic city centre and killed about 200 people, with 44 per cent of the buildings in the centre listed as having been destroyed or severely damaged. On September 25, sustained bombing of the wider city left more than 1,000 people dead.

The inner courtyard of the Archiginnasio,
which was completed in 1563

Travel tip:

The construction of the Archiginnasio, situated behind the Basilica di San Petronio, began after nearby Piazza Maggiore was remodeled under papal orders in the 16th century. It was commissioned by Pope Pius IV through the papal legate Charles Borromeo, who entrusted the project to the architect Antonio Morandi. The building, inaugurated on October 21, 1563, was to house the Schools of the Legisti (Canon and Civil law) and Artisti (philosophy, medicine, mathematics, natural sciences and physics). The building was named Archiginnasio after the classical term which was used to designate the Studium, as the University was first called, of Bologna. The Archiginnasio ceased to be the seat of the university in 1803, when the university moved to Palazzo Poggi, where it is still located today.  The original building now houses the Archiginnasio Municipal Library, the largest library in Emilia-Romagna.

The Basilica di San Petronio is the largest brick-built church
in the world, reaching 51m (167ft) high

Travel tip:

The Basilica di San Petronio, is the main church of Bologna, located in Piazza Maggiore in the centre of the city. It is the largest, brick-built church in the world. Building work began on the church in 1390 and it was dedicated to San Petronio, who had been the Bishop of Bologna in the fifth century. The 10th-largest church in the world at 132m (433ft) long and 66m (271ft), the vault reaches 45m (148ft) inside and 51m (167ft) in the facade. The basilica, built as a communal project, was finally consecrated in 1954. It has been the seat of the relics of Bologna's patron saint only since 2000.  Work on the facade was abandoned in the early 16th century by order of Pope Pius IV over fears that it would upstage St Peter's Basilica in Rome as the grandest church in Italy. It has never been completed.

More reading:

The 16th century plastic surgeon who pioneered nose jobs

San Marino is bombed by British planes

Allied troops land at Salerno

Also on this day:

1909: The death of Felice Beato, war photographer

1924: The birth of avant-garde musician Luigi Nono

1996: Fire destroys La Fenice opera house in Venice


Home

Giovanni Lanfranco - painter

Artist from Parma whose technique set new standards

Lanfranco was renowned for his dome frescoes, particularly
those inside the Basilica of Sant'Andrea della Valle in Rome

The painter Giovanni Lanfranco, whom some critics regard as the equal of Pietro da Cortona and Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) among the leading masters of High Baroque painting in Rome, was born on this day in 1582 in Parma.

A master of techniques for creating illusion, such as trompe l'oeil and foreshortening, he had a major influence on 17th century painting in Naples also, inspiring the likes of Mattia Preti, Luca Giordano and Francesco Solimena.

Lanfranco is best known for his Assumption of the Virgin (1625-7) in the duomo of Sant’Andrea della Valle in Rome, the altar fresco of the Navicella (1627-28) in St Peter’s Basilica, the cupola of the Gesù Nuovo church (1634-36) in Naples and the fresco of the Cappella del Tesoro, in Naples Cathedral (1643).

His St Mary Magdalen Transported to Heaven (c.1605), currently housed in the Capodimonte Museum in Naples, is another outstanding example of his work, as is The Ecstasy of the Blessed Margaret of Cortona (1622), in the Pitti Palace in Florence.

Lanfranco was inspired and influenced by the work of Antonio
da Correggio, who painted the dome of Parma Cathedral

Lanfranco’s dome frescoes were influenced by the work of Antonio da Correggio, the master of chiaroscuro who painted the Vision of St. John on Patmos (1520–21) for the dome of the church of San Giovanni Evangelista in Parma, and the dome of the Cathedral of Parma with a startling Assumption of the Virgin, displaying a use of illusionistic perspective and dramatic foreshortening that were ahead of his time.

Born Giovanni Gaspare Lanfranco, the third son of Stefano and Cornelia Lanfranchi, a poor family from Parma who lived in the Piazzale Santa Caterina, as a boy he was sent to be a page in the household of Count Orazio Scotti, a nobleman in Piacenza.

Without any other outlet for his natural fascination with creating pictures, he would draw on the walls using pieces of coal. Rather than being angry with the boy, the count arranged for him to begin an apprenticeship with the Bolognese artist Agostino Carracci, brother of Annibale Carracci, and was soon working alongside fellow Parmese Sisto Badalocchio in the local Farnese palaces.

When Agostino died in 1602, both young artists moved to Annibale's large Roman workshop, which was then involved in working on the ceiling of the Galleria Farnese in the Palazzo Farnese. Lanfranco is considered to have contributed to the panel of Polyphemus and Galatea and other works in the room.

A self-portrait of Lanfranco painted
between 1628 and 1632

Afterwards, along with Guido Reni and Francesco Albani, Lanfranco frescoed the Herrera (San Diego) Chapel in San Giacomo degli Spagnoli (1602–1607). He also participated in the fresco decoration of San Gregorio Magno and of the Cappella Paolina in Santa Maria Maggiore.

In 1617, Lanfranco's frescoes in the Sala Regia in the papal Palazzo del Quirinale won him admiration as one of Rome's most progressive painters and in the 1620s he introduced an approach to space that derived partly from the art of Tintoretto.

Lanfranco contrasted dominant foreground figures with partly hidden figures emerging from behind a rise, a departure from the approach taken by Annibale Carracci, Domenichino and Pietro da Cortona.

His dome frescoes for Sant’Andrea della Valle in Rome heralded the High Baroque, combining the Carracci figure style with Correggio's illusionistic methods. Domenichino, who won a share of the commission but was overshadowed by Lanfranco, is said to have been so jealous of his rival that he attempted to sabotage part of the scaffolding, hoping Lanfranco would fall to his death.

There was no love lost between the pair, who were fierce rivals for commissions throughout the 1620s, the ill-feeling between them not helped by Lanfranco's public accusation that Domenichino had plagiarized Agostino Carracci in his painting of the Confession of St. Jerome, now in the Vatican.

A plaque marks the house in Parma where Lanfranco was
born and raised in a poor family

From 1634 to 1646, Lanfranco worked in Naples, decorating the dome and pendentives of the Jesuit church of the Gesù Nuovo in Naples before moving on to fresco the nave and choir of the Certosa of San Martino.

This was followed by the decoration of Santi Apostoli and the dome of the Cappella del Tesoro di San Gennaro in the Cathedral of Naples.

He returned to Rome in 1646 and died there the following year, his last work being the apse of the church of San Carlo ai Catinari.

The Basilica of Sant'Andrea della Valle
is in Piazza Vidoni in Rome

Travel tip:

Sant'Andrea della Valle is a minor basilica in the rione of Sant'Eustachio of the city of Rome, located at Piazza Vidoni, at the intersection of Corso Vittorio Emanuele and Corso Rinascimento.  The building of the church followed a bequest made to the city by the duchess of Amalfi, Donna Costanza Piccolomini d'Aragona, who came from the family of Pope Pius II. It was dedicated to Saint Andrew as the patron saint of Amalfi. Work began in 1590 and was completed by 1560, with input from Giacomo della Porta and Pier Paolo Olivieri, Carlo Maderno and Francesco Grimaldi. The fresco decoration of the dome - the third largest in the city behind the St Peter’s Basilica and the Pantheon - was one of the most prestigious commissions of the time.

The Reale Cappella del Tesoro di San Gennaro in the
Naples Duomo was decorated by Lanfranco

Travel tip:

The Royal Chapel of the Treasure of St. Januarius - the Reale Cappella del Tesoro di San Gennaro - is a chapel in the Cathedral of Naples dedicated to Saint Januarius (San Gennaro), patron saint of the city. It is the most lavishly decorated chapel in the cathedral. Between 1526 and 1527, Naples suffered severe damage and loss of life first in a siege by the French, then a resurgence of the plague and finally a volcanic eruption of Vesuvius, with accompanying earthquakes. The surviving Neapolitans pledged to erect a chapel to San Gennaro to show their gratitude at being spared. Every year, on three specific occasions, the cathedral hopes to witness the liquefaction of the blood of the the saint, as preserved in two ampoules. In local folklore, the failure of the blood to liquefy signals that war, famine, disease or other disaster will befall the city.

More reading:

How Annibale Carracci left his imprint on Rome

Domenichino: a rival to Raphael

Why Francesco Solimena became an influence for a generation

Also on this day:

1482: The first printed version of the Hebrew Bible is completed in Bologna

1907: The birth of Gabriele Allegra, friar and scholar

1919: The birth of footballer Valentino Mazzola


Home

Francesco Solimena - painter

Neapolitan artist who influenced a generation

Francesco Solimena - a section from a self-portrait
painted in around 1730

Francesco Solimena, a prolific painter in the Baroque style who became one of the wealthiest and most influential artists in Europe, was born on this day in 1657 in Canale di Sereno, a village in Campania about 14km (9 miles) southeast of Avellino.

He spent most of his working life in Naples yet his fame spread far beyond and his work was in such demand among his wealthy patrons, including Prince Eugene of Savoy, Louis XIV of France and Pope Benedict XIII, that he acquired a considerable fortune, was given the title of baron and lived in a palace.

His workshop became effectively an academy, at the heart of the Naples cultural scene. Among many who trained there were the leading painters Francesco de Mura, Giuseppe Bonito, Corrado Giaquinto and Sebastiano Conca.

The Scottish portraitist Allan Ramsay was a pupil in his studio in around 1737-38.

Solimena’s own training came initially from his father, Angelo, a revered painter of frescoes, with whom he worked at the cathedral of Nocera in the province of Salerno, and at the church of San Domenico at Solofra, not far from his home village.  He often worked in Nocera later in life.

Solimena's spectacular Expulsion of Heliodorus from the
Temple can be seen in the church of Gesù Nuovo in Naples

By the time he was 17, however, he had settled in Naples, where he worked in the studio of Francesco di Maria and later Giacomo del Po. Cardinal Vincenzo Orsini - the future Pope Benedict XIII - became his patron at an early stage of his career and encouraged him to become an artist rather than take religious orders.

He modeled his art on the exuberant style of the Roman Baroque master Luca Giordano, whose work he admired while he was engaged in decorating the Sacristy of San Paolo Maggiore. His classical influences are attributed to Pietro da Cortona. Others whose techniques he adopted include Massimo Stanzione, Giovanni Lanfranco and Mattia Preti.

Solimena painted many frescoes and altarpieces in Naples, and was in demand for celebrations of weddings and courtly occasions.  He favoured simple settings so that attention would be concentrated on the figures in his paintings and their dress, often highlighted by his placing of those figures in pools of light. His representation of figures often derived from the work of Annibale Carracci, Domenichino, and Raphael.

The Madonna and Child with San
Gennaro that sold for $33,000 in 2017

He painted frescoes in many of the city's most important churches, including the vast and spectacular Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple (1725) in the church of Gesù Nuovo.

He became the unchallenged head of the Neapolitan school of painting during the first half of the 1700s, following the death of Giordano, and his influence remained in the aesthetic of Naples for many years.

Before his death at age of 89, in 1747 in Barra, then an area of grand villas to the east of Naples, Solimena had become very wealthy and had influenced a vast new generation of painters.

Today, his works are held, among other places, in the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the National Gallery in London, and the Louvre Museum in Paris.

A Madonna and Child with San Gennaro by Solimena sold at auction in Rome in 2017 for $33,000 (about €28,700).

The Collegiata di San Michele Arcangelo in Solofra

Travel tip:

The villages of Serino and neighbouring Canale di Serino fall into an area of Campania that produces wines from the Aglianico grape, notably Taurasi, Aglianico del Taburno and Falerno del Massico. The production of chestnuts is also a strong part of the local economy. The area was badly hit by the earthquake in 1980 that brought devastation to the region, but the richly decorated 17th century Baroque church - the Collegiata di San Michele Arcangelo - in nearby Solofra, which contains 21 framed canvases painted by Giovanni Tommaso Guarino, has survived, following a number of reconstructions, as has the church of San Domenico, where a painting by Solimena can still be seen.

The Basilica of San Paolo Maggiore is a church that
can be found on the bustling Via dei Tribunali

Travel tip:

The Baroque-style basilica of San Paolo Maggiore, the burial place of Gaetano Thiene, known as Saint Cajetan, is located in the centre of Naples on Piazza Gaetano, just off Via dei Tribunali, the narrow, straight thoroughfare known as Spaccanapoli. The church was built on the site of the 1st-century temple of the Dioscuri. The decoration of the church in the early 18th century fell largely to Solimena and Domenico Antonio Vaccaro. The church suffered considerable bomb damage in the Second World War, sadly, with some frescoes by Massimo Stanzione almost completely destroyed.

More reading:

How the work of Annibale Carraci illuminates Rome

The prolific output of Luca Giordano

Why Domenichino's talent rivals Raphael

Also on this day:

The Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi

1720: The birth of artist Giovanni Battista Piranesi


Home

Annibale Carracci – painter

Bolognese master produced his most influential work in Rome

A self-portrait of Annibale Carracci

The Baroque painter Annibale Carracci was born on this day in 1560 in Bologna.

Annibale and his followers were to become highly influential in the development of Roman painting, bringing back the classical tradition of the High Renaissance.

He was probably apprenticed as a painter with members of his own family in Bologna. But his talents began to develop during a tour of northern Italy in the 1580s. He lodged in Venice with the painter Jacopo Bassano, whose style of painting influenced him for a time.

Annibale has been credited with rediscovering the early 16th century painter Correggio, who had almost been forgotten outside Parma. Annibale’s Baptism of Christ, painted in 1585 for the Church of San Gregorio in Bologna, is a brilliant tribute to him.

In 1582 Annibale opened a studio in Bologna with his brother, Agostino Carraci, and his older cousin, Ludovico Carracci. While working there, Annibale painted The Enthroned Madonna with St Matthew in 1588 for the Church of San Prospero in Reggio.

By the time Annibale collaborated with the other two Carracci on frescoes in the Palazzo Magnani (now the Palazzo Salem) and two other noble houses in Bologna, he had become the leading master among them.

Carracci's Madonna Enthroned with St
Matthew hangs in a gallery in Dresden

In 1595 Annibale went to Rome to work for the rich, young cardinal Odoardo Farnese, who wanted the principal floor of his palace decorated with frescoes.

In Rome, Annibale studied Michelangelo, Raphael and ancient Greek and Roman art in order to adapt his style to his new surroundings.

After decorating the study in Palazzo Farnese, he was joined by his older brother, Agostino, in the chief enterprise of his career, painting the frescoes of the coved ceiling of the Galleria with love fables from Ovid.

These decorations were considered to be a triumph of classicism tempered with humanity. The powerfully modelled figures in these frescoes have been seen as an imaginative response to Michelangelo’s frescoes on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

The Galleria Farnese became an invaluable place for young painters to study until well into the 18th century and proved a rich feeding ground for Gian Lorenzo Bernini among others.

Annibale was underpaid for his long and intense labours in the Palazzo Farnese and he gave up working on it altogether in 1605.

Annibale's Baptism of Christ

He subsequently produced some of his finest religious paintings, including landscapes for the Palazzo Aldobrandini in Frascati that were to influence the work of Domenichino and Nicolas Poussin in Rome.

Annibale died at the age of 48 in 1609 in Rome after a few years of illness. He was buried according to his wish near Raphael in the Pantheon. Many of his assistants and pupils, such as Domenichino and Guido Reni, were later to become the pre-eminent artists for the next few decades.

Part of the ceiling at the Palazzo Fernese in Rome

Travel tip:

Palazzo Farnese, where Annibale Carracci did some of his best work in the Galleria, is one of the most important High Renaissance palaces in Rome. Owned by the Italian republic, the palazzo in Piazza Farnese was given to the French Government in 1936 for a period of 99 years and currently serves as the French embassy in Italy. One of the scenes in Puccini’s opera Tosca is set in Palazzo Farnese.

Carracci is buried alongside Raphael at The Pantheon in
Piazza della Rotonda in the heart of Rome

Travel tip:

The Pantheon in Piazza della Rotonda, is one of the best preserved ancient buildings in Rome. It was built as a temple but was converted into a Christian church in the seventh century. The Pantheon now contains the tombs of painters and kings. Along with Annibale Carracci, King Umberto I of Italy, King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy and Raphael are buried there.

Home

Guercino - Bolognese master

Self-taught artist amassed fortune from his work

Guercino - a self-portrait from about 1624-26,
which is part of a private collection

The artist known as Guercino was born Giovanni Francesco Barbieri on this day in 1591 in Cento, a town between Bologna and Ferrara in what is now the Emilia-Romagna region.

His professional name began as a nickname on account of his squint - guercino means little squinter in Italian.  After the death of Guido Reni in 1642, he became established as the leading painter in Bologna.

Guercino painted in the Baroque and classical styles. His best known works include The Arcadian Shepherds (Et in Arcadia Ego - I too am in Arcadia), showing two shepherds who have discovered a skull, which is now on display at the Galleria Nazionale di Arte Antica in Rome, and The Flaying of Marsyas by Apollo, which can be found in the Palazzo Pitti in Florence, both of which were painted in 1618.

The Vatican altarpiece The Burial of Saint Petronilla is considered his masterpiece.

Guercino's Burial of St Petornilla,
the Vatican altarpiece

Guercino's frescoes were notable for the technique of creating an illusionist ceiling and would make a big impact on how churches and palaces in the 17th century were decorated.

Mainly self-taught, Guercino became apprenticed at 16 to Benedetto Gennari, a painter of the Bolognese school at his workshop in Cento before moving to Bologna in 1615.

There he made the acquaintance of Ludovico Carracci, whose work was a great influence on him. Carracci encouraged him and Guercino's use of bold colours, and his ability to capture emotion in faces, was an echo of Carracci's style, although some of his early work also bears the stamp of Caravaggio. 

As his style developed, Guercino's altarpieces in particular were noted for their depth, achieved by his use of light and darkness.  His 1620 altarpiece of the Investiture of Saint William - currently housed at the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Bologna - is a great example.

In 1621, Guercino went to Rome, where he was influential in the evolution of Roman High Baroque art. His commissions included the decoration of the Casino Ludovisi, where his outstanding fresco, Aurora, adorns the ceiling of the Grand Hall.  It creates the illusion that there is no ceiling, with Aurora’s chariot painted as if it were moving directly over the building.

A detail from the ceiling at the Casino Ludovisi in Rome

He also painted the ceiling in the church of San Crisogono in the Trastevere district, a portrait of Pope Gregory XV (now in the Getty Museum) and the St. Petronilla Altarpiece in the Vatican, which is now housed in the Museo Capitolini.

Some critics believe Guercino's move to Rome brought about a subtle change in his style - in the view of some critics, not necessarily for the better - due to the influence of Pope Gregory XV’s private secretary, Monsignor Agucchi, who was a proponent of the classicism of Annibale Carracci, whose work was somewhat more restrained than his cousin, Ludovico.

He is said to have felt under pressure to paint in the popular classical style on his return to Cento two years later, largely because most of his paying clients wanted traditional paintings.

Guercino ran his Cento studio until 1642, when Guido Reni died. Guercino moved to Bologna, taking over Reni's religious picture workshop, and was quickly recognised as the city's leading painter.

Guercino's tomb at the church of Santissimo Salvatore

Notable for his prolific output - he completed more than 100 large altarpieces for churches and around 144 other paintings during his career - Guercino continued to paint and teach until his death in 1666, amassing a notable fortune.

As he never married, his estate passed to his nephews and pupils, Benedetto Gennari II and Cesare Gennari. His tomb is in the church of Santissimo Salvatore in Via Cesare Battisti in Bologna.

Travel tip:

The town of Cento, situated in the flatlands of the Po Valley equidistant from Bologna and Ferrara, grew from a fishing village in the marshes to an established farming town in the first few centuries in the second millennium.  Previously controlled by the Bishop of Bologna, it was seized by Pope Alexander VI and made part of the dowry of his daughter Lucrezia Borgia.  Main sights include the 18th century Palazzo del Monte di Pietà, which houses the Civic Gallery and some paintings by Guercino, whose works can be seen also in the Basilica Collegiata San Biagio, Santa Maria dei Servi, the church of the Rosary, and, in the frazione of Corporeno, the 14th-century church of San Giorgio.

Guercino's Madonna del Passero is part
of the Pinacoteca Nazionale collection

Travel tip:

Bologna's Pinacoteca Nazionale can be found in Via delle Belle Arti, a little over a kilometre from Piazza Maggiore to the north-east, inside a former meeting place for young Jesuits in the university district. The Pinacoteca's origins go back to 1762, when paintings from two other collections, one belonging to the Carracci family, were brought together. During the time of Napoleonic rule the most important works were hidden in Paris and Milan. The basis for the current collection was formed in 1827 with a catalogue of 274 paintings.  The gallery nowadays consists of 30 exhibition rooms showing works by Bolognese artists from the 14th century onwards, including a number of important canvases by the Carracci brothers, Annibale and Agostino, and their cousin Ludovico. Notable works include Ludovico's Madonna Bargellini, the Comunione di San Girolamo (Communion of St Jerome) by Agostino and the Madonna di San Ludovico by Annibale. There are 15 works by Guercino and 29 by Guido Reni.  Also represented in the gallery are Vitale di Bologna, Perugino, Giotto, Raphael, El Greco and Titian.

More reading:

How mystery still surrounds the death of Caravaggio

Titian - the Venetian giant of Renaissance art

The skill that enabled Giotto to bring figures on canvas to life

Also on this day:

1848: Students join uprising in Padua



(Picture credit: Guercino tomb by Sailko via Wikimedia Commons)

Home