Appendix 3—
Passion Cycles in Italy

Passion cycles, whether paintings or sculpture, usually occur in specialized contexts, decorating chapels and buildings dedicated to the Sacrament or the Passion. They are also found on objects of religious furniture whose function is related to the Eucharist and on innumerable altarpieces featuring the Crucifixion or Lamentation. The dedication to the Sacrament of a group of chapels in the Veneto and Lombardy probably determined that these chapels' iconography illustrate the Passion. Maurice E. Cope, in The Venetian Chapel of the Sacrament in the Sixteenth Century: A Study in the Iconography of the Early Counter Reformation (New York, 1979), 256–60, discusses two examples—the cycles of Bernardino Luini in San Giorgio al Palazzo in Milan, 1516, and of Tintoretto in San Cassiano in Venice, 1595. Both illustrate the general theme of the Passion even if their emphasis differs, Luini stressing the physical sacrifice of Christ—the Flagellation, the Ecce Homo, the Crowning with Thorns, the Crucifixion—and Tintoretto the theme of salvation: the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, Christ in Limbo.

A Passion cycle must have been chosen for the Oratorio del Gonfalone in Rome, completed in the 1570s, because of the special devotion of the confraternity there to the cult of the Passion. This cycle relates in twelve scenes the major historical events leading to Christ's sacrifice: the Entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, the Agony in the Garden, the Capture of Christ, Christ before Caiaphas, the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Ecce Homo, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, the Descent into Limbo, and the Resurrection. Guglielmo della Porta's plan for Passion scenes in relief on the equestrian monument to Charles V, a commission he received around 1549–50, may have directly reflected Tridentine concerns. The monument, never executed,

would have been an impressive combination of imperial and religious imagery, a Christianized parallel to the Marcus Aurelius monument. The reliefs della Porta designed were to have decorated the interior walls of an oval chapel formed by the base of the monument. All that remains of this project is the sketchbook of della Porta, thoroughly treated by Werner Gramberg, Die Düsseldorfer Skizzenbücher des Guglielmo della Porta (Berlin, 1964) vol. 1, 17, 54–56, cat. no. 59; 81–86, cat. nos. 141–44. For my discussion of the possible relationship between these designs and Giambologna's Entombment relief (Plate 12) see Chapter 5.

The most notable examples of church furniture decorated with a Passion cycle are Donatello's San Lorenzo pulpits. Liturgical practice determined their program, as Irving Lavin has pointed out in "The Sources of Donatello's Pulpits in San Lorenzo: Revival and Freedom of Choice in the Early Renaissance," AB 41 (1959): 19–38. Other furnishings similarly decorated are the Corpus Domini silver casket in Genoa and the marble ciborium Jacopo del Duca made for the high altar of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Rome. The Corpus Domini casket, begun in the 1550s and now in the Cathedral Treasury of Genoa, was made specifically to contain the Sacrament in the annual Feast of Corpus Domini; thus the Passion cycle decorating its sides directly reflects its function. Even more than the Gonfalone cycle, the Corpus Domini cycle illustrates the historical events leading to Christ's sacrifice: the Last Supper, the Agony in the Garden, the Betrayal, Christ before Caiaphas, Christ before Pilate, the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Ecce Homo, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, the Deposition, and the Entombment. Luca Grimaldi must have known this casket; it was a civic commission and one of the cathedral's treasured objects. Although the choice of scenes does not seem to relate closely to that in the Grimaldi Chapel, some of the designs do; these are discussed in Chapter 5. In contrast to the Corpus Domini casket and the Grimaldi Chapel, Jacopo del Duca's marble ciborium in Rome eliminates any references to the trial of Christ, depicting the Last Supper, the Agony in the Garden, the Flagellation, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, the Deposition, the Lamentation, and the Resurrection, stressing the suffering of Christ rather than the historical events of the Passion. The iconography of del Duca's ciborium, dating from 1570, appears to be a rare example of an immediate response to Carlo Borromeo's directive calling for the depiction of Passion cycles on ciboria. For the complete text of this see Carlo Borromeo, "Instructiones fabricae et supellectis ecclesiasticae," cap. 13 "De tabernaculio Sanctissimae Eucharistiae," in Paola Barocchi, Trattati d'arte del cinquecento (Bari, 1961), vol. 3, 22.

Passion cycles are also found sometimes in contexts where the Crucifixion or Lamentation is the central scene. The Passion cycle by Callisto Piazza (c. 1500–1561), made in the 1530s for the Church of the Incoronata in Lodi,

decorates the Chapel of the Crucifixion; see G. Panazza, Mostra di Girolamo Romanino (Brescia, 1965), 189–91, 264–66. This cycle was painted between 1534 and 1538, according to Rossana Bossaglia, "Le fonti di Callisto Piazza e le parafrasi düreriane," Arte Lombarda 9 (1964): 106–11. Piazza's more famous contemporary, Romanino, did an extensive Passion cycle in the Church of Santa Maria della Neve in Pisogne (Brescia), now in a ruinous state, and participated with Pordenone and Altobello Melone in another cycle for the cathedral of Cremona. Two altarpieces by Lodovico Brea show a similar emphasis. One, dated 1485, in the church of Cimiez, province of Nice, depicts the Crucifixion in the center, surrounded by smaller scenes of the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Way to Calvary, and the Man of Sorrows. Another, done in 1505 for the priest of the cathedral of Monaco, places the Lamentation in the center, surrounded by the Agony in the Garden, the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Way to Calvary, and the Crucifixion. For Brea see L. H. Labande, Les Brea (Nice, 1937), 71–77, pls. 15, 16. Another painter active in the Maritime Alps was Giovanni Canavesio, who painted at least one Passion cycle, in 1482, in a church outside Pigna in San Bernardo. See Colette Dufour et al., La pittura a Genova (Genoa, 1970), 168–69, figs. 96–98. Still another northern Italian Passion cycle, in sculpture, Tomaso Rodari's marble ancona of about 1519 in the cathedral of Como, depicts the Crucifixion as the central scene, surrounded by the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Way to Calvary, and the Deposition. All four of the cycles just mentioned include the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, and either the Crowning with Thorns or the Deposition—a similarity striking enough to suggest a common source; their programs stress the physical suffering of Christ, omitting any trial scenes or post-Crucifixion miracles.

The only other significantly large group of Passion cycles in Italy is the remote precedent of those found on Tuscan painted crosses of the dugento. On these, narrative scenes of the Passion accompany the large devotional image of Christ on the cross. The number of scenes varies from six to ten, as does the selection of events, which depends on the thematic focus of each cross. For instance, Pisa no. 20 focuses on the divine and miraculous attributes of Christ by illustrating the Descent from the Cross, the Lamentation, the Entombment, the Three Marys at the Tomb, the Super at Emmaus, and Christ Appearing to Saint Thomas. Another, Uffizi no. 432, eliminates all miraculous events and stresses the pain and suffering of the last day by representing the Washing of the Feet, the Betrayal, the Flagellation, the Deposition, the Entombment, and Limbo. Only occasionally is the trial of Christ depicted, as in the cross in San Frediano, Pisa. See Evelyn Sandberg-Vavala, La croce dipinta italiana (Verona, 1929), chapter 8, especially 242–57, for a lengthy discussion of Passion iconog-

raphy on these crosses. When the image of the enthroned Madonna and Child, popular in fourteenth-century Italy, replaced the painted crosses, instances of the Passion cycle in Italy became less frequent. The emphasis had shifted from a suffering Savior to a joyful divine infant full of hope and promise. The popularity of Passion cycles in northern Europe, in contrast to Italy, suggests a sustained and consistent interest, particularly in the areas that are now Germany, Belgium, and Holland, where Passion cycles proliferated from about 1400 on. The opportunity they afforded of depicting the suffering of Christ is evident in images of Christ as the Lamb of Sacrifice and of the Christ of Pity. These images were produced in manuscripts, stained glass, reliefs, and textiles, as well as in painting and sculpture. An excellent discussion of the retables is found in Michael Baxandall, The Limewood Sculptors of Renaissance Germany (New Haven, 1980). See also T. Müller, Sculpture in the Netherlands, Germany, France, and Spain, 1400–1500 (Harmondsworth, 1966); W. Paatz, Süddeutsche Schnitzaltäre der Spätgotik (Heidelberg, 1963); J. Roosval, "Retables d'origine néerlandaise dans les pays nordiques," Revue Belge 3 (1933): 136–58. Several short books by J. de Borchgrave d'Altena cover the Flemish work: La Passion dans la sculpture en Hainaut de 1400 à 1700 (Mons, 1971); La Passion du Christ dans la sculpture en Belgique du XIe au XVIe siècles (Paris and Brussels, 1946); Les Retables brabançons, 1450–1550 (Brussels, 1942); La Passion du Christ dans l'art ancien au pays mosan (Liège, 1935).

Wooden retables depicting the Passion of Christ decorated altars in churches all over northern Europe; they were so popular that workshops in Brussels and Antwerp produced them for export as well as for local markets. The selection and number of Passion scenes vary among the many extant examples, but similarities are more striking than differences. The altar of Jan Borman the Younger in Saint-Denis, Liège, may be considered typical of the wooden retables of this time and place. In this work the large central scene of the Crucifixion is surrounded by five episodes—the Flagellation, the Crowning with Thorns, the Way to Calvary, the Deposition, and the Lamentation—all emphasizing the physical suffering of Christ. In the predella five scenes depict the capture and trial of Christ, thus relegating the judgment scenes to a less important position. The centers of production of these retables were only a few hours from Douai, Giambologna's birthplace, and from Mons, the place of his apprenticeship. If he saw them, as we can assume he did, he must have found their lively narrative qualities memorable.

Passion cycles in the graphic arts of northern Europe were understandably popular—as witness the many examples by Schongauer, Dürer, and Lucas van Leyden. The whole Passion story could be recounted in detail. Dürer's Small Passion, for example, consists of thirty-seven scenes. Furthermore, because these graphic works circulated easily, their designs became known throughout

Europe. Pontormo's fresco for the Certosa di Galuzzo (1523–24), depicting Christ before Pilate, is only one instance of the influence of Dürer's graphic designs in Italy.

What emerges from this survey of Passion cycles is that they were more consistently popular as well as more numerous in northern Europe than in Italy. Although Passion cycles appeared in Italy during the fifteenth century and the early sixteenth, especially in the Veneto and Lombardy, they were confined largely to areas that were easily in contact with northern Europe and thus perhaps influenced by northern taste.