Friday, May 16, 2008

The "Twin" Churches

Our class went on a walk on Friday to a couple different places that had to do with one of the books we are reading, and we ended in Piazza del Popolo. In this Piazza, there are two famous churches, Santa Maria di Montesanto and Santa Maria Di Mircoli right across from each other, often referred to as the "twin" churches for their extremely similar appearance. The main significant difference here is that Santa Maria Di Mircoli has a circular dome and Santa Maria di Montesanto has an oval dome. The architect Carlo Rainaldi designed Santa Maria di Montesanto this way in order to fit it in the narrower plot of land. the churches are beautiful from the outside and on the inside as well. They were built here under order of Pope Alexander VII during the Roman 17th century restoration.

The interior of the churches were beautiful. I took a few pictures of the parts that interested me most. To the side of the nave (main walkway of the church), part of the ceiling was constructed with a beautiful painting of a dove and stone sculptures of angels around it. It was absolutely
stunning. I could have stayed there for hours looking at it. Also, one of the tabernacles off to the side caught my because thought the use of color in the marble and the color of the paint used was very cool looking. I really liked a solid color statue of a nun holding a crucifix for its humbleness. I am intrigued with the continuous theme of death throughout many of the churches here. I included a picture in the slide show of what is very common in these churches. It is a painting off to the side of the nave of a person of importance with a tomb underneath it containing his body. The last thing in these churches I feel worth noting is the black marble used in the pillars and design of the church. It is odd for me to see so much darkness in a church; at home and in many churches here, dark colors I feel are avoided, most likely because of its orientation with death or evil.

Please look at the post below for pictures of the objects I just referenced.

1 comment:

Hurricane B said...

Kevin - nice pics! Cool to follow your experience. Try it all! TTYS - CWB