Humility of Saint Francis
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Authors
Giuseppe Rusnati and Bernardo Falcone
Date
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Image
Language
Keyword
St. Francis , Humility , Brothers , Disciples
Alternative Title
Abstract
Most Sacro Monte chapels from the end of the seventeenth century are significantly larger and more crowded with figures than those built in the first half of the century. Chapel Thirteen is an example of this. The sixty-one figures inside were completed in 1692 by Bernardo Falcone (c. 1630 - c. 1697) and Giuseppe Rusnati (c. 1650 - 1713). Both of these sculptors were active at other Sacri Monti throughout their careers; Rusnati decorated chapels at Varese and Domodossola and Falcone oversaw the construction of the colossus of Saint Carlo for the unfinished Sacro Monte at Arona. The frescoes were painted between 1690 and 1692. Giovanni Battista Grandi (1643 - 1718) and his brother Gerolamo Grandi (1658 - 1718) completed the architectural elements, and the figures were added by Federico Bianchi (c. 1635 - 1719). The chapel was funded by Costanzo Besozzo, a nobleman from Milan who visited the Sacro Monte and later joined the Capuchin Order. His sister and heir, Aurelia, the Countess of Carugate, also helped finish the chapel, perhaps by overseeing construction efforts after her brother's death. The porch and iron grille were added in 1698 and are crowned by an eagle, the Besozzo family crest. Saint Francis is shown processing through the streets of Assisi, nude and with a noose around his neck as an act of humility and public repentance. The crowd and chaotic atmosphere has led modern experts to describe this scene as taking place during Carnival, but early biographies and Orta's first guidebooks record that Francis' penance took place during Advent. Among the well-dressed women and men dressed as Roman soldiers, Rusnati has included beggars, cripples, brawlers, a prisoner in chains, a woman of color, a man with dwarfism, and a monkey wearing a neck-ruff. / Orta is the second oldest Sacro Monte. Construction began on the chapels there in 1591, just over a hundred years after the first Sacro Monte site was established at nearby Varallo. A community of Capuchin friars lived on the mountain, oversaw construction, and guided visitors on their pilgrimages once the chapels were finished. One of the brothers, Cleto da Castelletto Ticino (1556 - 1619) designed a series of thirty-six mysteries for the site, although only twenty chapels were ever completed. Before joining the Capuchin Order, Cleto had trained as an architect and engineer. After construction began at Orta, he also worked alongside Pellegrino Tibaldi (1527 - 1596), one of Carlo Borromeo's favorite architects. Amico Canobio (1532 - 1592), a Benedictine Abbot and Commissioner of the secular lands within the diocese of Novara, oversaw Cleto's work and was the first major patron of the chapels at Orta. Carlo Bascapè (1550 - 1615) took charge of directing the progress at Orta as soon he was named Bishop of Novara in 1593, the year after Canobio's death.
Description
Sacro Monte, Orta
Citation
Elena De Filippis and Fiorella Mattioli Carcano, Guida al Sacro di Orta (Omegna & Novara: Litotipografica Editoriale Gianni Fovana & Ente gestione riserve naturali speciali del Sacro Monte di Orta del Monte Mesma e del Colle della Torredi Buccione, 2001), 36 - 37; Guido Gentile, Sacri Monti (Torino: Einaudi, 2019), 271 - 290; Cynthia Ho, Kathleen Peters, and John McClain, Sacred Views of Saint Francis: The Sacro Monte di Orta (Santa Barbara: Punctum Books, 2020), 90 - 95, 161 - 170; Santino Langé, Sacri Monti Piemontsi e Lombardi (Milano: Tamburini Editore, 1967), 20 - 25; Pier Giorgio Longo, Antiche guide del Sacro Monte di Orta (tra XVII e XVIII secolo) (Novara: Italgrafica slr & Ente gestione riserve naturali speciali del Sacro Monte di Orta del Monte Mesma e del Colle della Torredi Buccione, 2008), 100 - 103 & 196 - 199; Father Angelo Maria Manzini, Sacro Monte di Orta. (Milan: Tipolito Testori, 2006), 46 - 47; Enrico Massone Ed., Sacri Monte in Piemonte: Itinerari nelle aree protete di Belmonte, Crea, Domodossola, Ghiffa, Orta, Varallo (Torino: Kosmos, 1994), 105 - 127; Geoffrey Symcox, Jerusalem in the Alps: The Sacro Monte of Varallo and the Sanctuaries of North-Western Italy (Turnhout: Brepolis, 2019), 207 - 218; Luigi Zanzi and Paolo Zanzi Eds., Atlante dei Sacri Monti prealpini (Milan: Skira, 2002), 94 - 95.