Valle Intelvi

Il volume offre uno studio storico-documentario e artistico sugli organi a canne delle chiese della Valle Intelvi, per ciascuno dei quali viene offerta una scheda tecnico-fonica. La ricerca è completata da brevi excursus storico-artistici sulle antiche chiese in cui gli organi sono conservati.

The great sculptor Ercole Ferrata (Pellio Intelvi, 1610-Roma, 1686) left many great Baroque art works in Rome and through Europe, but few evidences of his activity in his homeland, where he arranged different money donations for religious buildings of Pellio Inferiore, especially the oratory of the Madonna del Garello. In the paper the master’s legacy, consisting of eight wooden statues and his portrait, since 1966 displayed in the Museo Diocesano of Scaria Intelvi, is reconsiderd on the basis of new documentary evidences. In the second part of the essay an Immaculate statue from the parish church of San Giovanni in Bellagio is attributed to the artist.

Il Museo Diocesano di Scaria Intelvi conserva otto modelli lignei raffiguranti la Vergine e vari santi, donati dallo scultore intelvese Ercole Ferrata al paese natale di Pellio di Sotto, ricordati negli inventari relativi al patrimonio artistico del Dipartimento del Lario, compilato per il territorio intelvese nel 1798 da Rocco Comaneddi, il quale precisava che “il prezioso monumento di otto statuine” doveva servire “per studio alla gioventù”. Partendo da questa traccia il contributo mira a proporre una riflessione sul significato dei doni degli artisti ai loro luoghi di origine e sull’influenza che questa tradizione ha avuto sulla produzione artistica di questi luoghi nel quadro degli scambi tra Roma e la Lombardia nei secoli XVII e XVIII, segnalando inoltre il ritrovamento (2019) del Crocifisso eburneo nella chiesa di Pellio già appartenente al lascito di Ferrata e sinora trascurato dagli studi.

Ercole Ferrata (Pellio di Sotto, Como, 1610 - Rome, 1686) was an important sculptor in Seventeenth-century Rome, following two protagonists such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Alessandro Algardi. The eight wooden sculptures from Ferrata’s studio, deposited by his heirs in the parish church of San Michele in Pellio di Sotto and now displayed in the Museum of Scaria Intelvi since 1966, testify to the strong and lasting bond with the native valley. In his will, drawn up in 1685, the sculptor ordered the materials of his studio to be intended for the public benefit and, above all, of his homeland. To these eight small wooden sculptures, we can now add an ivory Crucifix, mentioned in pastoral visits in the Nineteenth century, then forgotten and considered missing, which is proposed here to be recognized in the one mentioned in the inventory of the sculptor’s house, particularly in his bedroom, where Ferrata died in 1686. Therefore, the Crucifix and the eight models are testimonies of an exceptional human and artistic experience; they offer the opportunity not only to reconsider the history of the dispersion of Ferrata’s studio, but also to better understand its organization, then to measure Ferrata’s long legacy in Lombard sculpture between Seventeenth and Eighteenth centuries.