Soon in theaters docufilm on Borromini and his rivalry with Bernini

Coming to theaters only on May 15, 16, 17 is the docufilm Borromini and Bernini. Challenge to Perception, directed by Giovanni Troilo, who specializes in documentaries on art (with to his credit the direction of docufilms such as Frida. Viva la vida, Monet’s Water Lilies. A Spell of Water and Light and Power of Rome), on a subject by Luca Lancise, produced by Sky and Quoiat Films and distributed by Nexo Digital as part of the Great Art at the Movies season.

Borromini and Bernini. AChallenge to Perception is the tale of the architectural revolution of a lone genius, Francesco Borromini, who changed the appearance of Rome forever through a personal challenge to conventions and prejudices, with the humility to learn from the past in order to invent the future, with the courage to pursue an idea while paying the price to the end. Borromini’s style is recognizable, eccentric, different: it differs from that of his contemporaries and exudes an austere spiritual authority, with perennial allusions that evoke the infinite. But this is also the story of the most famous artistic rivalry ever, that between Francesco Borromini (Bissone, 1599 - Rome, 1667) and Gian Lorenzo Bernini (Naples, 1598 - Rome, 1680), and above all the story of Borromini’s rivalry with himself: a genius so attached to his art that he turned it into a demon that devoured him from within, until it drove him to choose death, in a dramatic gesture, in order to touch eternity.

Francesco Borromini was not yet 20 years old when he arrived in Rome on foot from Milan, leaving his parents and his job as a humble stonemason at the Duomo to pursue his dream of working on the most prestigious building site of his time, the Fabbrica di San Pietro. It is 1619, Rome is the center of Western art, the place where every painter, sculptor, and architect who desires glory and who considers Michelangelo his master absolutely wants to be. It is here that new construction sites of churches, fountains, noble palaces and headquarters of young and ambitious religious congregations from all over Europe are sprouting up every day: starting with the new St. Peter’s Basilica, the Church has decided to use art and urbanism as a powerful means of fascination and persuasion and as a symbol of greatness before the world, to revive its message after the shock caused by Martin Luther’s Protestant Reformation. This is the story of Borromini, a young man born in Canton Ticino who moved there where the art of his time found its beating heart. He became a pupil of Carlo Maderno, who took him on as his assistant and represented a second father to him, deprived himself of everything to pursue a dream, became one with his art, with no ambition other than to succeed in it by struggling to establish himself.

Borromini and Bernini. Challenge to Perception winds its way through the streets of Rome, between Palazzo Barberini, St. Peter’s, St. Charles at the Quattro Fontane, Sant’Andrea al Quirinale, the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, the Basilica of St. John Lateran, Piazza Navona, the Church of Sant’Ivo alla Sapienza, Villa Adriana in Tivoli, and then travels to Paolo Portoghesi’s Villa-Garden in Calcata, Viterbo, until it reaches Borromini’s Tomb in San Giovanni Battista dei Fiorentini, where the artist still rests today.

The visual journey is given voice and thought by contemporary re-enactments, featuring actors Jacopo Olmo Antinori, Pierangelo Menci and Antonio Lanni, and talks by experts involved in the film: art critic and filmmaker Waldemar Januszczak, architect and academic Paolo Portoghesi, professor Jeffrey Blanchard of Cornell University in Rome, associate professor at the University of Camerino Giuseppe Bonaccorso, curator and art critic Aindrea Emelife, and professor Daria Borghese, professor of medieval and modern art history at American University in Rome.

The original soundtrack, written directed and performed by composer and pianist Remo Anzovino, will be released in the fall on the Nexo Digital label / Believe distribution, in the Nexo Soundtracks series. Great Art at the Movies is an original and exclusive project of Nexo Digital. For 2023, La Grande Arte al Cinema is exclusively distributed in Italy by Nexo Digital with media partners Radio Capital, Sky Arte, MYmovies.it and in collaboration with Abbonamento Musei. The list of theaters where it will be possible to see Borromini and Bernini. Challenge to Perception will be available at nexodigital.it.

Soon in theaters docufilm on Borromini and his rivalry with Bernini

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