Santa Maria del Carmine, Florence

Coordinates: 43°46′05″N 11°14′38″E / 43.7680°N 11.2439°E / 43.7680; 11.2439
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The unfinished façade.
The interior.
The Corsini Chapel.
The vault of the nave by Domenico Stagi.

Santa Maria del Carmine is a church of the Carmelite Order, in the Oltrarno district of Florence, in Tuscany, Italy. It is famous as the location of the Brancacci Chapel housing outstanding Renaissance frescoes by Masaccio and Masolino da Panicale, later finished by Filippino Lippi.

History

The church, dedicated to the

Carmelite convent,[1] which still exists today. Of the original edifice only some Romanesque-Gothic
remains can be seen on the sides.

By the 14th century, it was the seat of a number of lay fraternities. The complex was enlarged a first time in 1328 and again in 1464, when the capitular hall and the refectory added, though the church maintained the Latin Cross, one nave plan.

Renovated in the

quadratura
fresco by Domenico Stagi.

Brancacci Chapel

The Brancacci Chapel also survived the fire, and was saved by the subsequent restoration by the intervention of a Florentine noblewoman who was firmly opposed to the covering of the frescoes. The chapel is home to the famous frescoes by Masaccio and Masolino, considered the first masterwork of the Italian Renaissance. Masaccio's master Masolino, commissioned by a wealthy merchant, Felice Brancacci, began work on the chapel in 1425 and was soon joined in the project by his pupil, Masaccio. The scenes by Masolino are St Peter Healing a Lame Man and Raising Tabitha from the Dead, St Peter Preaching, and Adam and Eve. Those by mostly Masaccio are The Tribute Money, St Peter Healing with his Shadow, The Crucifixion of St Peter, The Baptism of the Neophytes, and The Expulsion from Paradise.[2] Their treatment of figures in believable space made the frescoes among the most important to have come out of the Early Renaissance. The cycle was finished by Filippino Lippi.

The elaborated Italian Rococo ceiling is from one of the most important 18th century artists in the city, Giovanni Domenico Ferretti.

Corsini Chapel

The

Bishop of Fiesole
, and who was canonized in 1629.

The architect Pier Francesco Silvani choose for it the Baroque style then popular in Rome. The altar has a marble bas-relief depicting the Glory of St Andrea Corsini, sculpted by Foggini, and above a God the Father sculpted by Carlo Marcellini. On the sides of the altar are two more Foggini marble bas-reliefs: one depicts Sant'Andrea descends girded with sword to lead the Florentines to victory during the Battle of Anghiari and the other recalls a Miraculous vision of the Virgin by a young Sant'Andrea (occurring in the church of the Convent delle Selve).

The small dome was frescoed by Giordano in 1682. The frescoes suffered in the great church fire, and were restored by Stefano Fabbrini.[3]

The convent

The convent suffered in its history from numerous disasters, from the 1771 fire to the

1966 River Arno flood. Most of the artworks are therefore fragmentary: these include the Bestowal of the Carmelite Rule by Filippo Lippi and the Last Supper by Alessandro Allori, and remains of works from other chapels by Pietro Nelli and Gherardo Starnina
.

The second refectory is decorated with the Supper in Simon the Pharisee's house by Giovanni Battista Vanni (c. 1645); it also houses fragments of frescoes by Lippo d'Andrea.

Other burials

References

  1. ^ a b ""Cappella Brancacci", Musei Civici Fiorentini". Archived from the original on 25 February 2021. Retrieved 20 December 2019.
  2. ^ Paul Joannides (1993) Masaccio and Masolino: A Complete Catalogue. Phaidon: London.
  3. ^ Firenze antica, e moderna illustrate, Volume 8, by V. Follini, M. Rastrelli, (1802), pages 103-105.

External links

43°46′05″N 11°14′38″E / 43.7680°N 11.2439°E / 43.7680; 11.2439