Figure 1.
Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice.
Reproduced from Wikipedia, accessed July 26, 2021, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campo_Santi_Giovanni_e_Paolo#/media/File:Veneto_Venezia4_tango7174.jpg
CLOISTERED IN A VENETIAN CAMPO
TERRI FUELLING
Venice’s Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo (Figure 1) may be conceived of as an urban memory theatre where artworks and participants engage in a highly nuanced mnemonic interplay. The campo footprint functions as the theatre stage; public artworks such as the Colleoni monument, wall reliefs, coats of arms, and the well-head, serve as props and cues. The conjoined façades of the campo’s key institutions – the Scuola Grande di San Marco and the Basilica dei Santi Giovanni e Paolo – form a monumental theatrical backdrop. Detailed analysis of the campo’s artefacts reveals a persistent theme of protection that supports and aligns with the human need for security. Vernacular collective memories, derived from the lived or shared experiences of small groups, and official collective memories, grounded in powerful, long established cultural institutions (Bodnar 1993, 14,247) (Confino 1997, 1401), are blended and manipulated to achieve a sense of well-being that draws people into the space and entices them to linger.
Functioning as something of a lynchpin within the space, the most imposing protective element of Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo is the equestrian monument to Bartolomeo Colleoni (1400-1476) (Figure 2), the esteemed condottiere (mercenary captain) from Bergamo who provided distinguished military service to the Venetian republic. The monument’s overall effect is one of explosive energy, powerful assertiveness and bristling individualism – qualities that directly challenged established notions and closely held Venetian cultural values of collective identity and collaboration. Territorial instability at the time of its installation may have paved the way for Venetians to relax their established values and accept the image as a potent and welcome symbol of the Republic’s military might.
Notably, it is the monument’s equestrian theme that has perpetuated itself through the centuries, to the extent that the campo’s western access point is now named Ponte Cavallo (Horse Bridge) and the busiest café in the campo operates under the title of Cafe Cavallo. It seems that the messages and motifs of domination, supremacy and individualism incorporated in the Colleoni monument have undergone a gradual process of ‘vernacularisation’ through time. The horse motif, rather than the mercenary himself, has become a symbol of strength and protection unique to this campo, and now leads a battalion of other such apotropaic indicators to avert evil influences or bad luck from the space (Wills 2002, 64) (Figure 3).
The most sacred of these signs relates to an episode in the life of the Virgin Mary known as the Annunciation – the celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary that she will conceive and become the mother of God. The source of Venice’s affiliation with the Virgin Mary can be traced back to the personification of Venice herself being founded on the figure of Justice, with sword and scales in hand, seated on a Solomonic throne and flanked by lions (Rosand 2001, 47). That figural association between the virgin goddess of Justice and virgin (unconquered) Venice became conflated with the Virgin Mary herself, a relationship legitimised by their shared holy day of March 25 (Rosand 2001, 47).
A relief depicting the Annunciation is clearly visible on the façade of a house over the Rio dei Mendicanti. In addition, two Byzantine sculptural reliefs are located on the pilasters flanking the basilica’s entry portal – the Virgin Annunciate on the left, and the Archangel Gabriel on the right. Together, these two reliefs placed adjacent to one another and in matching frames represent the Annunciation. These reliefs join another Annunciation over the bridge to promote the sanctity of the Republic, while warding off evil at a more vernacular level. The Annunciation’s presence in Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo can be read as an attempt to enlist the Virgin’s sacred patronage and protection.
The Virgin’s guardianship is further sought in a smaller 14th-century relief of the Madonna and Christ-child on the basilica’s southern flank, and then in a 17th-century tabernacle (1615) on the base of the arch of the Ponte Cavallo (Rizzi 2014, 231, 235). The Madonna on the basilica is flanked by archangels (Ferguson,1989, 97). Angels in general play a guardian role in Christian doctrine, thus creating a supplementary apotropaic layer within the same image. Other higher ranking celestial sentries – cherubs (putti), hover above the basilica portal, prance around the communal well-head, and act out rhetorical tales on the scuola entrance columns. This network of sacred custodians on the campo’s terra firma is complemented by a secular set of grimacing mascaroni (sculptural human heads) warding off water-borne foe from both flanks of the Ponte Cavallo. Finally, the scuola and basilica facades’ crowning statuary stands in formation along the upper most realm of the theatrical backdrop joining their legion of apotropaic artefacts to guard, protect and instil a sense of safety and well-being in the campo community.
List of References
Bodnar, John. Remaking America: Public Memory, Commemoration, and Patriotism in the Twentieth Century. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993
Confino, Alon. “Collective Memory and Cultural History: Problems and Method.” American Historical Review, 102 (1997): 1386-1405.
Ferguson, George. Signs and Symbols in Christian Art. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.
Rizzi, Alberto. Scultura Esterna a Venezia: Corpus delle Sculture Erratiche all’aperto di Venezia e della sua Laguna, seconda edizione. Venice: Filippi Editore, 2014.
Rosand, David. Myths of Venice: The Figuration of a State. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2001.
Wills, Garry. Venice: Lion City: The Religion of Empire. New York: Washington Square Press, 2002.
Figure 2.
Andrea del Verrocchio and Alessandro Leopardi, Monument to Bartolomeo Colleoni, 1496, bronze and marble, approx. 14 m high including socle. Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice.
Figure 3.
Apotropaic motifs in Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo.
