Author of the entry: Gianluca Forgione

On 7 November 1748, Raimondo di Sangro paid Francesco Maria Russo one hundred ducats, completing the 150 agreed between artist and patron before the notary Giovanni Bottigliero, for the painting to be executed on the vault of the ‘Pietatella’ (Nappi 2010, pp. 98, 124, doc. 387). The decoration, signed and dated ‘FRANCISCVS RVSSO PINXIT ANNO DOMINI 1749’, is not recorded in the Breve nota di quel che si vede in casa del principe di Sansevero don Raimondo di Sangro nella città di Napoli (1769), apart from a brief reference to the illusionistic dome painted ‘within the great arch of the high altar’ (pp. 12–13; cf. Attanasio 2011, p. 59). The 1771 inventory of the Prince’s estate also treats the work summarily (fols. 127v–128r; cf. Attanasio 2011, pp. 152–153). More revealing is the mention of the Gloria del Paradiso in the will Sansevero drew up in his own hand on 7 August 1770, where the ‘painting of the ceiling’ is listed among the very few works that his first-born, Vincenzo di Sangro, would be permitted to alter, ‘making use of the best painter available’, and with the intention ‘of reworking it in a more refined manner, better conceived and suited to the order and character of the Chapel’s ornaments’ (Testamento 1770, fols. 45v–46r; cf. Chartulae desangriane 2006, p. 107).

Raimondo had in any case already sounded the abilities of the artist to whom he entrusted the first major commission undertaken in the Chapel. As deputy of the Treasury, the Prince had supervised the commission of the Trionfo della Fede frescoed on the vault of the antechamber of the sacristy of the Cappella di San Gennaro in Naples Cathedral, for which ‘Nicolò and Francesco Rossi’ received instalments in January 1744 (Nappi 2010, p. 124, doc. 388; Nicolucci, Conte 2018, p. 104, docs. 1–2). Although the Gloria del Paradiso did not fully satisfy him, Di Sangro nevertheless continued to employ Russo, who, as ‘house painter’, ‘ornamental painter’, and ‘guazzista’, repeatedly received payment between March 1763 and March 1765 (Nappi 2010, pp. 125–126, docs. 392–395; Masucci, Spruit, in Raimondo di Sangro 2020, pp. 238, 241, 252, 255). Russo is also credited with the painted architecture in the balustraded tribune to the left of the high altar (Picone 1959, p. 66); the patron’s regard for him is further indicated by his being entrusted with the design of Raimondo’s own mausoleum, whose execution is problematically connected with the date 1759 inscribed on the base (cf. entry 24).

The fresco represents the Epiphany of Paradise: a sky filled with light, populated by circling angels and putti, centred on the dove of the Holy Spirit bearing the triangular symbol of the Trinity, through which the supernatural world breaks into the centre of the vault, disrupting its illusionistic architecture. Above the arch leading to the high altar, angels support a sun inscribed ‘Mater Pietatis’, alluding to the dedication of the Chapel; in the surrounding monochrome medallions, the family saints, Randisio, Berardo (cardinal), Filippa, Rosalia, Oderisio, and Berardo (abbot), witness the beatific vision. In Raimondo’s iconographic vision, the contemplation of Truth is thus the ultimate end of the soul, provided that the deceptive and labyrinthine course of its earthly existence (mirrored in the path of the faithful through the Di Sangro Chapel) has been conducted in accordance with Christian virtues and with faith in the sacrifice of the Son of God, represented in Francesco Celebrano’s Pietà on the high altar (Forgione 2022, pp. 51–54).

The architectural illusionism of the vault, the false dome, and the manifestation of paradisiacal glory recall the most authoritative models of Roman Baroque decoration, which Raimondo had come to know close at hand during his decade of study with the Jesuits at the Seminario Romano from 1720. Russo must have been directed to refer explicitly to the precedents painted in the last quarter of the seventeenth century in the Roman churches of the Gesù and Sant’Ignazio by Giovan Battista Gaulli, known as Baciccio (1639–1709), and Andrea Pozzo (1642–1709). It is very probable that the Prince and his painter studied and discussed Pozzo’s designs through the engraved plates of the Jesuit’s well-known treatise on perspective, published in two volumes between 1693 and 1700 (Cioffi 1994, pp. 65–68). To realise a project of this derivative kind, Raimondo appears to have selected a painter, formed within a Solimenesque milieu, who had also acquired practical experience in quadratura, plausibly in connection with theatrical scenography (Nicolucci, Conte 2018). The evident disparity in quality between the Roman models and Russo’s results in the illusionistic and anamorphic treatment of space, together with a chromatic intensity perhaps not entirely in keeping with the overall tone of the Chapel (de Sangro 1991, p. 147), led Raimondo, as noted, to include the vault painting among the few elements of the Chapel that his heir was authorised to rework.

Essential bibliography on the work

Breve nota di quel che si vede in casa del principe di Sansevero don Raimondo di Sangro nella città di Napoli, [Naples] 1769, pp. 12–13.

Testamento di Raimondo di Sangro, Naples, notary Francesco de Maggio, 1770, copy of the document held at the Archivio Storico del Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli, d’Aquino di Caramanico collection, provisional shelfmark A.160, fols. 45v–46r.

Inventario de’ beni rimasti nell’eredità del fu eccellentissimo don Raimondo di Sangro principe di Sansevero, Naples, notary Francesco de Maggio, 1771, copy of the document held at the Archivio Storico del Pio Monte della Misericordia di Napoli, d’Aquino di Caramanico collection, provisional shelfmark A.162, fols. 127v–128r.

Picone Marina, La Cappella Sansevero, Naples 1959, pp. 64–66.

de Sangro Oderisio, Raimondo de Sangro e la Cappella Sansevero, Rome 1991, pp. 146–147.

Cioffi Rosanna, La Cappella Sansevero. Arte barocca e ideologia massonica, first edition: Salerno 1987; edition cited: Salerno 1994, pp. 65–68.

Chartulae desangriane. Il Principe committente, exhibition catalogue, Bruno Crimaldi (ed.) (Naples, Museo Cappella Sansevero, 28 March 2006), Naples 2006, p. 107.

Nappi Eduardo, Dai numeri la verità. Nuovi documenti sulla famiglia, i palazzi e la Cappella dei Sansevero, Naples 2010, pp. 98, 124, doc. 387.

Attanasio Sergio, In casa del Principe di Sansevero. Architettura, invenzioni, inventari, Naples 2011, pp. 40–41, 59, 152–153, 165.

Napoli, la Cappella Sansevero e il Cristo velato. Naples, Sansevero Chapel and the Veiled Christ, texts by Marco Bussagli, photographs by Carlo Vannini, Bologna 2019, pp. 152–161.

Raimondo di Sangro. Cronaca di vita e opere, Fabrizio Masucci and Leen Spruit (eds), Naples 2020, p. 69.

Forgione Gianluca, I simulacri delle cose. La Cappella Sansevero e il barocco romano, Turin 2022, pp. 51–54.

Comparative bibliography

Pozzo Andrea, Perspectiva pictorum et architectorum…, Rome, Typis Joannis Jacobi Komarek, Pars Prima, 1693, and Pars Secunda, 1700.

Nappi Eduardo, Dai numeri la verità. Nuovi documenti sulla famiglia, i palazzi e la Cappella dei Sansevero, Naples 2010, pp. 98, 124–126, docs. 388–395.

Nicolucci Roberto and Conte Vincenzo, ‘Transiti. Francesco Rossi fra l’antisagrestia della Cappella del Tesoro e la Cappella Sansevero’, in San Gennaro patrono delle arti. Conversazioni in Cappella 2018, Stefano Causa (ed.), Naples 2018, pp. 78–105.

Raimondo di Sangro. Cronaca di vita e opere, Fabrizio Masucci and Leen Spruit (eds), Naples 2020, pp. 52–54, 215, 238, 241, 252, 255.

DOI: 10.82049/CATALOGO28