Entrance into Jerusalem
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Authors
Bartolomeo Badarello da Campertogno, Giovanni d'Enrico, and Giuseppe Arrigoni
Date
Type
Image
Language
Keyword
Jesus , Disciples , Jerusalem , Entrance , Passion , Passover
Alternative Title
Abstract
This chapel is based on designs by Galeazzo Alessi that are collected as part of a manuscript called the Libro dei Misteri (1565 - 1569), which is housed in Varallo's Biblioteca Civile. Construction was already underway by 1572 and concluded sometime between 1576 and 1580. The sculptures were modeled by Bartolomeo Badarello, from nearby Campertogno. Some of the figures are made of terracotta and some are made of stucco covered by a layer of terracotta, according to Stefani Perrone. Those with stucco cores probably form the earliest group, dating to 1580 - 1583, the end of the period that Galloni described as Varallo's "epoca dello stucco" (1540 - 1580). Around the turn of the seventeenth century Carlo Bascapè instructed the fabbricieri to add to the crowd around the turn of the century and Giovanni d'Enrico installed a few additional figures circa 1617. Comparing the existing scene to the first image of the chapel, which was published in Giovanni Giacomo Ferrari's Brevi considerazioni Sopra i Misteri del Sacro Monte di Varallo (1611), suggests that all of the figures between Christ and the viewer were installed after that guidebook was published. The interior decorations were restored by Giovanni Martissi in 1715. The two figures closest to pilgrims were also remade, or replaced, by Giuseppe Arrigoni in 1721 and repainted by Pietro Borsetti the following year. Some confusion persists about the various artists that worked on the frescoes in Chapel Nineteen and which figures were added by each painter. An early notarial document of 1590 records that the frescoes were painted by Gian Giacomo Testa (c. 1550 - c. 1614), a local painter from Varallo. Scholars have also given the works to Giovanni Battista della Rovere (1561 - 1627), who was called Il Fiamminghino, and Giovanni (Jan) Miel (1599 - 1663) of Antwerp. It is also possible that Testa's original frescoes were repainted by one of these other artists at a later date. Pietro Borsetti added two figures under the painted archway on the right-hand wall in 1722 and Giovanni Avondo painted a small crowd under the arch on the left in 1817, including a self-portrait. This archway represents the Porta Aurea, which was the gate that early-modern Christians believed Jesus had passed through when he entered Jerusalem. In 1723, Giovanni Battista Morondi (1700 - 1770), an architect from Varallo, built a three-dimensional version of the Porta Aurea between Chapels Nineteen and Twenty, and Pietro Borsetti added the painted decorations. Jerusalem's Golden Gate is now believed to have been built in the sixth or seventh century AD. The frescoes in this scene were repainted in 1890 by Francesco Burlazzi (1846 - 1908). The roof of Chapel Nineteen was rebuilt and raised in 1884. Conservators have carried out two restoration campaigns inside the chapel in the last fifty years, in 1970 and 1993. / Varallo was the first Sacro Monte in Northern Italy. The collection of chapels on the hilltop overlooking Varallo was established by Bernardino Caimi (before 1450 - 1499 or 1500) as a way of recreating the sights and experiences of a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. He organized the chapels according to their Holy Land geography and incorporated architectural details from the pilgrimage churches corresponding to each scene. Caimi chose Varallo to be the site of his New Jerusalem in 1481, he received papal permission to begin collecting donations in 1486, and he is believed to have overseen the project from 1491, when the first chapel was finished, until his death. Different writers have counted each of these dates as the year of the Sacro Monte founding. Many of the early chapels were decorated by Gaudenzio Ferrari (c. 1480 - 1546), who was born nearby and gained a reputation during his lifetime as one of the leading painters in Lombardy. Saint Carlo Borromeo (1538 - 1584) visited the Sacro Monte multiple times while he was Archbishop of Milan (1564 - 1584). Carlo and his contemporaries implemented new policies to clarify Catholic doctrine and structure spiritual practices in Milan after the Council of Trent (1545 - 1563). Carlo Bascapè (1550 - 1615), Saint Carlo's close friend and the Bishop of Novara, personally oversaw a building campaign to reorganize the chapels at Varallo and restructure the pilgrimage experience according to the ideals of the Counter-Reformation. These changes were largely based on designs by Galeazzo Alessi (1512 - 1572), which are collected and preserved in a manuscript called the Libro dei Misteri (1565 - 1569) in Varallo's Biblioteca Civica. Construction continued throughout the first half of the seventeenth-century, led primarily by Giovanni d'Enrico the Younger (c. 1559 - 1644) and his family workshop. Beginning in 1609, d'Enrico also supervised the construction of the new Basilica, which is dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin. The Basilica was consecrated in 1649 and the old church, or Chiesa Vecchia, was demolished in 1773, but the Chiesa Nuova was not finished until the façade was added in 1891 - 1896.
Description
Sacro Monte, Varallo
Citation
Samuel Butler, Ex Voto: An Account of The Sacro Monte or New Jerusalem at Varallo-Sesia (London: Tübner & Co., 1888), 161 - 162; Gaudenzio Bordiga, Storia e guida del Sacro Monte di Varallo (Varallo: Francesco Caligaris, 1830), 55 - 57; Girolamo Cattaneo, Guida per ben vistare la nuova Gerusalemme nel Sacro Monte di Varallo (Varallo: Francesco Calligaris, 1826), 41- 42; Elena De Filippis, Guida del Sacro Monte di Varallo (Borgosesia: Tipolitografia di Borgosesia, 2009), 78 - 79; Pietro Galloni, Sacro Monte di Varallo (Varallo: Tip. G. Zanfa, 1914), 229; Giovanni Giacomo Ferrari. Brevi considerazioni Sopra i Misteri del Sacro Monte di Varallo (Varallo: Pietro Revelli, 1611), unpaginated; Tomasso Nanni. Dialogo sopra i Misteri del Sacro Monte di Varallo (Varallo: Pietro Revelli, 1616), unpaginated; Joshua Prawer and Haggai Ben-Shammai, The History of Jerusalem: The Early Muslim Period (638 - 1199). (New York: New York Università Press, 1996), 42; Stefania Stefani Perrone, Guida al Sacro Monte di Varallo (Torino: Kosmos Edizioni, 1995), 52 - 54.