A great Renaissance artist--in the principality of Monaco!

When one thinks of the principality of Monaco, the associations that automatically jump to mind are usually three: the Casino, the Formula 1 Grand Prix and, of course, the prince. However, as you know (especially if you’ve been following us for a while), we don’t like “stereotypical” trips, so to speak, so the last time we set foot in the principality of Monaco we immediately went in search of... art! :-) And we found it, moreover, in one of the most beautiful places in the little statelet that lies just a few kilometers from the border between Italy and France. And it is also about great art! So today we are telling you about two works by a great Italian Renaissance artist that you can find in the principality: the artist is Ludovico Brea, the greatest exponent of the Renaissance in Liguria. We also dedicated an episode of our podcast to him!

The Cathedral of Monaco

To find his works we have to go up to Monaco-Ville. We usually tend to identify the principality with its most famous district, namely Monte Carlo (which in French is spelled with a hyphen between the two words: Monte-Carlo). In fact, the principality is divided into ten districts (which used to be four: Monaco, Monte-Carlo, La Condamine and Gain sur la mer): Monaco-Ville is one of these ten districts, and it is the most important one since the headquarters of all the main institutions are located here: the Prince’s Palace, the Government, the National Council (i.e., the parliament of Monaco), the seat of the City Hall, and the court. Monaco-Ville is also home to the imposing Cathedral, dedicated to the Immaculate Virgin: it is the most important church in the principality and is most famous because inside are the tombs of princes, including Rainier III and Grace Kelly. That of Grace Kelly, princess consort, is the most photographed and token tomb by visitors entering the Cathedral, as well as the one that records the highest number of expressions of affection. It is inside the Cathedral that the two Monegasque works by Ludovico Brea are located: the Polyptych of Saint Nicholas and the Pieta.

The artist was active for a long time in Genoa and the Ligurian west as he was a native of Nice: we must consider that at the time of Ludovico Brea, who was born around 1450, Nice was the seat of a county that depended on the domains of the Savoy, and had several commercial and cultural exchanges with Genoa and thus with the region we know today as Liguria. Monaco, which lies halfway between Nice and Ventimiglia, was even then an independent lordship: it became a principality in 1612. Since Ludovico Brea’s name, by the end of the 15th century, had already acquired a certain importance, since the artist had executed several works in both Nice and Genoa, the then lord of Monaco, John II, who was engaged in a policy of patronizing the arts and letters, decided to call Ludovico to Monaco to commission some paintings from him.

Ludovico Brea, The Polyptych of Saint Nicholas.

The first of these was precisely the Polyptych of St. Nicholas, so called because it was intended for the church of St. Nicholas, which no longer exists: it was located where the Cathedral now stands. This was a very prestigious commission, because the panel dedicated to the titular saint of the church, is the most important panel in the church itself. In this splendid painting, Saint Nicholas is in the center, sitting on his chair, classical and therefore typically Renaissance, painted in a very strong green color, unrealistic, but exceptionally striking. And, if you pay attention, you will notice that in every compartment of the polyptych, there is always a green detail, be it an object, a robe, or the floor on which the characters stand! St. Nicholas is clad in the typical bishop’s robe (as is the headdress, which is rich in precious gems) and carries on his lap the three golden orbs that allude to a legendary episode concerning the saint. In fact, it seems that St. Nicholas had given these golden orbs to three poor girls who wanted to marry but did not have dowries: thanks to St. Nicholas’ gift, they were able to fulfill her dream. This legend is also the basis of the tradition that sees St. Nicholas as the origin of the figure of Santa Claus! Near him, as typical for polyptychs of the time, we have several saints: from the left, Saint Michael, Saint Stephen, Saint Lawrence, and Saint Mary Magdalene. Other saints, smaller, on the sides: on the left one, starting from the top, we have St. Barbara, St. Bernard, St. Clare and St. Devota (the latter is the patron saint of Monaco), while on the right side we have St. Brigid, St. Blaise, St. Margaret and St. Cecilia. In the upper register we have in the center a Christ in the sepulcher between Our Lady and St. John, and on the sides, from the left, we note St. John the Baptist, the Archangel Gabriel, Our Lady Announced, and St. Anne.

At the stylistic level, in addition to the exceptional monumentality of Saint Nicholas in the cathedra, we should note the realism with which the features of the characters are depicted, which for the time was very high: this realism derived to Ludovico Brea from his study of Lombard painting of the time, which was probably the most realistic of the Renaissance, and the fact that a Niçois had studied Lombard painting is due to the fact that, again, trade and cultural exchanges between Liguria and Lombardy were very frequent. We also note the gold background: we are used to seeing it in paintings from earlier periods, for example in paintings of the 14th or early 15th centuries. Even if Ludovico Brea was a contemporary of the great Michelangelo (to have a term of comparison: Michelangelo’s very famous Pietà was finished three years before Ludovico Brea’s Polyptych of St. Nicholas, which dates from around 1500), the gold background is not to be considered as a particular result of an outdated artistic personality. It was a precise stylistic choice, because the Provençal painters, to whom Ludovico Brea drew inspiration, still preferred the gold background: evidently, the patrons’ tastes must also have been particularly influenced by Provençal painting. Ludovico Brea was also able to create backgrounds with typically Renaissance landscapes: the apparent anachronism is actually the result of a choice.

Ludovico Brea, The Pieta

And of this, Ludovico Brea gives us a demonstration with the other work in Munich Cathedral, his Pieta made shortly after the polyptych of Saint Nicholas: we are in 1505. This is another polyptych, the central panel of which, however, occupies the entire panel vertically and represents, precisely, a pieta. That is, the episode in which the Madonna holds up the lifeless body of Christ deposed from the cross. In the iconography of pieta, the Madonna is often alone, but in this case she is accompanied by St. John and St. Mary Magdalene who, like her, mourn Jesus. It all takes place at the foot of the cross. And, in the background, is a landscape: beyond the hill of Calvary, on which the cross is planted, we notice a barren landscape, with a village on the left and the mountains fading into the background. The arched body of Christ, however, refers back to another source of Ludovico Brea, Flemish painting, while the veracity of the characters’ expressions (their pain is rendered tangibly) is still due to Lombard painting.

In the lower left corner we notice a kneeling figure: he is the commissioner of the painting, the curate Antonio Teste, so much so that the painting is also known as the “Pietà of the curate Antonio Teste.” We know his name as it is written in the tag that appears at the bottom, near the bottom edge, where we also find the artist’s signature and the date when the work would have been finished: April 1, 1505. Above, we notice instead a long cartouche with an inscription in Latin. It is an invitation to the viewer: he is asked if the pain he feels is similar to the pain Jesus felt. On either side of the main scene, we have six small panels, one on each side, depicting different stories of Jesus’ Passion. In none of them does the gold background appear: we can therefore speculate that the difference between this work and the previous one was dictated by specific requests of the commissioner... !

Two works, therefore, that are very beautiful and elegant but above all very interesting: they take us back about five hundred years and acquaint us with different aspects of the historical and artistic context of the time. And above all, two works that show us how in the principality of Monaco it is possible to overcome stereotypes! So, has our Ludovico Brea enticed you to stay in Monaco? See you on your next trip :-)))

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