“Manifestations of insolent atheism”: San Moisè and Santa Maria del Giglio
5 March 2023
Visited two baroque churches, both reviled by Ruskin.
“The churches raised throughout this period are so grossly debased, that even the Italian critics . . . exhaust their terms of reproach upon these last efforts of the Renaissance builders. The two churches of San Moisè and Santa Maria Zobenigo, which are among the most remarkable in Venice for their manifestation of insolent atheism, are characterised by Lazari, the one as ‘culmine d’ ogni follia architettonica [the culmination of every architectural lunacy’, the other as ‘orrido ammasso di pietra d’ Istria [a hideous mass of Istrian stone]’, with added expressions of contempt, as just as it is unmitigated”
(John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Vol 3)
San Moisè (St Moses)
What an exuberant facade. I can see what Ruskin meant, but I rather like it, nonetheless.
Photography is not permitted inside the church so I’ve obtained some images of the interior from Wikipedia, with the extraordinary altarpiece which combines sculpture and painting.
Interior of San Moisè (source: Wikipedia)
Altarpiece, San Moisè. Moses at Mount Sinai receiving the Tablets, sculpture by Heinrich Mayring, painting by Michelangelo Morlaiter (source: Wikipedia)
And here is Santa Maria del Giglio (or Zobenigo). Rebuilt in the late 17th century. Facade by Giuseppe Sardi, begun 1678.
It’s a beautifully proportioned facade, but pretty outrageous for a church, being entirely devoted to the glorification of the donor, the admiral Antonio Barbaro, with statues of him and his family, and relief maps of places where he served.
Here’s Ruskin again:
“In like manner, the Church of Santa Maria Zobenigo is entirely dedicated to the Barbaro family; the only religious symbols with which it is invested being statues of angels blowing brazen trumpets, intended to express the spreading of the fame of the Barbaro family in heaven. At the top of the church is Venice crowned, between Justice and Temperance, Justice holding a pair of grocer’s scales, of iron, swinging in the wind. There is a two-necked stone eagle (the Barbaro crest), with a copper crown, in the centre of the pediment. A huge statue of a Barbaro in armor, with a fantastic head-dress, over the central door; and four Barbaros in niches, two on each side of it, strutting statues, in the common stage postures of the period,—Jo. Maria Barbaro, sapiens ordinum; Marinus Barbaro, Senator (reading a speech in a Ciceronian attitude); Franc. Barbaro, legatus in classe (in armor, with high-heeled boots, and looking resolutely fierce); and Carolus Barbaro, sapiens ordinum: the decorations of the façade being completed by two trophies, consisting of drums, trumpets, flags and cannon; and six plans, sculptured in relief, of the towns of Zara, Candia, Padua, Rome, Corfu, and Spalatro.”
(John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Vol 3)
