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Giacomo Giorgetti (1603-1679)


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Giacomo Giorgetti in:   Assisi    Spello

Giacomo Giorgetti, who was the son of the painter Vincenzo Giorgetti, became both a painter and an architect.  He seems to have been in Rome in 1623-4, where his father was acting as a procurator for the canons of San Rufino.  He was first documented as an artist in Assisi in 1626, when he was paid for frescoes of coats of arms (now lost) in San Rufino.  He seems to have been absent from Assisi in 1636-44, but otherwise worked extensively in his native city, often with Cesare Sermei and Girolamo Martelli, in the flood of “modernisation” that engulfed Assisi at that time.

Giacomo Giorgetti advised the friars of Santa Maria degli Angeli on aspects of its construction in 1670-5.  They ceded him a burial site in the crossing of the church in 1676, and he was buried there three years later.

Assisi

Work in Chiesa Nuova (ca. 1621)

     

The decoration of the chapels of the newly built Chiesa Nuova is attributed to a team that seems to have been led by Cesare Sermei and to have included both Vincenzo and Giacomo Giorgetti.  The works specifically attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti include the frescoes of the Cappella dell’ Immaculata (illustrated above), which depict:

  1. the birth of the Virgin (on the left); and

  2. Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (on the right).

These are the earliest works that are attributed to him.

Decoration of the Cappella delle Stimate (ca. 1631)

This chapel in Santa Maria degli Angeli, which belonged to the Franciscan Third Order, was decorated by Cesare Sermei and Giacomo Giorgetti in ca. 1631.  The surviving documents do not specify which artist did which work; the work attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti on stylistic grounds includes:
  1. the panel of the Verification of the Stigmata (on the left wall, illustrated here);

  2. the fresco of Tertiaries taking the Franciscan habit (in the vault); and

  3. the altarpiece depicting  Stigmatisation of St Francis.

Work on Santa Maria sopra Minerva (1634)

Giacomo Giorgetti remodelled the interior of Santa Maria sopra Minerva (which is so-called because it occupied the cella of the Roman Temple of Assisi) in 1634.  Specifically, he:
  1. extended the church backwards, which required the demolition of the back wall of the temple;

  2. removed the room that had been built in the upper part of the cella and built a new barrel vault; and 

  3. designed the high altar, which is made mostly from gilded stucco. 

A panel (17th century) of St Jerome in the sacristy is attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti.

St Antony Abbot (ca. 1634)

Bishop Tegrimo Tegrimi commissioned a substantial programme of decoration of in Oratorio di San Gregorio from Giacomo Giorgetti in 1634.  Only this panel of St Antony Abbot, which is on the altar on the right,  survives.

Palazzo Bernabei (1646-61)

The heirs of Bishop Francesco Sperelli commissioned the design of this palace (now Palazzo Bernabei) from Giacomo Giorgetti.

Work in San Francesco

Frescoes (1646-8)

The friars commissioned these frescoes from Giacomo Giorgetti for the walls of the sacristy of the Lower Church of San Francesco.  They were destroyed in a fire in 1952.

Charity and Prudence (1659)

   

These frescoes by Giacomo Giorgetti are to the sides of the entrance arch of the Cappella di San Ludovico in the Lower Church of San Francesco.

Work on Palazzo Giacobetti Vallemani (1648-55)

Count Paolo Giacobetti commissioned Giacomo Giorgetti to extend Palazzo Giacobetti Vallemani  in 1648-55.  This involved the incorporation of adjacent properties into the original palace (ca. 1600), which presumably took on its current appearance at this time.



Frescoes in the Galleria dei Vescovi (1653-6)

Cardinal Bishop Paolo Emilio Rondanini  commissioned the frescoes of this room in Palazzo Vescovile, which are attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti.  They depict the the Rondanini arms and personifications of the virtues claimed for the family.  This web page on the site of GER-SO Srl illustrates their work on the restoration of these frescoes after the earthquake of 1997.

Panels from Palazzo dei Priori (1657)

    

These panels by Giacomo Giorgetti, which originally decorated the ceiling of the Sala del Consiglio of Palazzo dei Priori, are now in the Pinacoteca Comunale.  They depict:

  1. SS Rufinus and Victorinus receiving crowns of martyrdom; and 

  2. St Elizabeth of Hungary appearing to the dying St Clare.

Cappella del SS Sacramento (1663-8)

      

The inscription at the entrance to this chapel in San Rufino records that it was rebuilt using money that Girolamo Ortorio Paci left to the Compagnia del Sacramento.  Construction was carried out in 1663-6 to a design by Giacomo Giorgetti. 

He also provided a design (1668) for the stucco decoration of the vaults and executed an oval fresco (1668) there, which depicts an allegory of the Eucharist.  Work on this chapel then seems to have been halted, probably for financial reasons.

Altars in San Rufino (1664)

Giacomo Giorgetti is associated with two altars in the left aisle of in San Rufino:

  1. In 1662, part of the bequest of Girolamo Ortorio Paci was used to rebuild the Altare della Immacolata Concezione to a design by Giacomo Giorgetti, on the understanding that the work would be complete by 1664.  This altar was demolished in 1672.

  2. The design Altare di Sant Antonio di Padova (1664) and the execution of its original altarpiece are both attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti.  The altarpiece, which depicts a vision of St Antony of Padua in which the Madonna handed the Christ Child to him, was removed when the altar was re-dedicated to St Emidius in 1751 and is now in the Museo Diocesano.






St Antony Abbot (1670-5)

The Confraternita di Sant' Antonio Abate commissioned this panel from Giacomo Giorgetti for the Cappella di Sant' Antonio Abate in Santa Maria degli Angeli.  Payments to him for this work are documented in 1670 and in 1675.

Marriage of the Virgin (17th century)

This panel was documented in Sant’ Antonio da Padova in 1869, and associated with a preparatory sketch by Giacomo Giorgetti.  It was restored in 1989 and is now in the Pinacoteca Comunale.






St John's Apparition of the Virgin on Patmos (17th century)

This panel by Giacomo Giorgetti was documented in Oratorio di San Crispino in 1875.  It was subsequently moved to Palazzo Vescovile and is now in the Museo Diocesano

Martyrdom of St Laurence (1679-80)

A surviving document records that, in 1680, Pietro Montanini was commissioned to paint a banner for one of the confraternities of Assisi (probably the Confraternita dei San Lorenzo) that Giacomo Giorgetti had left unfinished when he died in 1679.  [Where is it now?]

[Is this the banner in the Museo Diocesano?? ]

Spello

Stigmatisation of St Francis (ca. 1652)

This altarpiece in Santa Maria Maggiore (on the 4th altar on the right) is attributed to Giacomo Giorgetti.  The figure at the lower left might be  a portrait of the donor, who was probably a member of the Dominici family: it has also been suggested that it is a self-portrait of the artist.  This is one of the few works by or attributed to him that survive outside Assisi.



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