Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
In fact, the indulgent deployment of col-
oured, inlaid marbles is one of the true high-
lights of Neapolitan baroque design. Used to
adorn tombs in the second half of the 16th cen-
tury, the inlaid look really took off at the be-
ginning of the 17th century, with everything
from altars and floors to entire chapels clad in
mix-and-match marble concoctions.
The undisputed meister of the form was
Cosimo Fanzago. Revered sculptor, decorator
and architect, he would cut the stone into the most whimsical of forms, producing lus-
cious, Technicolor spectacles. From early works like the Tomb of Mario Carafa in the
Santissima Annunziata and a marble epitaph to Cardinal Ottavio Acquaviva in the Cap-
pella del Monte di Pietà, the fiery Fanzago got his big break in 1623 with a commission to
complete and decorate the Chiostro Grande (Great Cloister) in the Certosa di San Martino.
To Giovanni Antonio Dosio's original design he added the statues above the portico, the
ornate corner portals and the white balustrade around the monks' cemetery.
Impressed, the resident Carthusian monks offered him further work on the Certosa
church, a job he continued on and off for 33 years, and one beset with legal dramas. Des-
pite the animosity, Fanzago gave his robe-clad clients one of Italy's greatest baroque cre-
ations, designing the church's facade and lavishing its interior with polychrome Sicilian
marble. The result would be a mesmerising kaleidoscope of colours and patterns, and the
perfect accompaniment to works of other artistic greats, among them painters Giuseppe de
Ribera, Massimo Stanzione and Francesco Solimena.
Fanzago took the art of marble inlay to a whole new level of complexity and sophistica-
tion, as also seen in the Cappella di Sant'Antonio di Padova and the Cappella Cacace,
both inside the Complesso Monumentale di San Lorenzo Maggiore. The latter chapel is
considered to be his most lavish expression of the form.
Fanzago's altar designs were equally influ-
ential on the era's creative ingénues. Exempli-
fied by his beautiful high altar in the Chiesa di
San Domenico Maggiore, his pieces inspired
the work of other sculptors, including Barto-
lomeo and Pietro Ghetti's altar in the Chiesa di
San Pietro a Maiella, Bartolomeo Ghetti and
siblings Giuseppe and Bartolomeo Gallo's ver-
sion in the Chiesa del Gesù Nuovo, and Gi-
useppe Mozzetti's exquisite choir in the Chiesa di Santa Maria del Carmine.
While Greek Doric columns are short and
heavy and baseless, with plain, round capitals
(tops), Ionic columns are slender and fluted,
with a large base and two opposed
volutes
(or
scrolls) below the capital. Corinthian columns
are fancier still, with ornate capitals featuring
scrolls and acanthus leaves.
In
Medieval Naples: An Architectural & Urb-
an History 400-1400
, Caroline Bruzelius,
William Tronzo and Ronald G Musto deliver a
thoroughly researched review of Naples' ar-
chitecture and urban development from late
antiquity to the high and late Middle Ages.
