Pio V and Palazzo Venezia: the relief with Cristo at the Fariseo's House and the bronze bust of the pontiff

CYCLE: Deposits on Display
SPEAKER: Cristina Conti, Clara Seghesio
DATE: Tuesday 29 October, 6 pm

The VIVE inaugurates the first conference of the Deposits on show cycle, linked to an exhibition itinerary dedicated to the valorisation of the VIVE's works currently not on public display.

The cycle is part of the study activities conducted by the VIVE since 2020 on works from its collections. The research was carried out through systematic scientific cataloguing, entrusted to working groups of mostly young specialists, coordinated by university professors.

The first lecture of the cycle is dedicated to the presentation of the studies by the researchers Clara Seghesio and Cristina Conti with the coordination of Barbara Agosti on two works in dialogue with each other, united by the common thread of the commission of Pope Pio V (1566-1572): the relief with Cristo at the House of the Fariseo, and the bronze bust of Pio V.

The relief, made by Angelo Marini, which comes from storage, is a precious cog in the monumental altar machine conceived by Giorgio Vasari at the request of the pontiff for the basilica of Santa Croce in Bosco Marengo, Alessandria. Thanks to a renewed critical and historical analysis, Clara Seghesio was able to revise the attribution of the work, identifying the author in Angelo Marini known as the Sicilian.

The bronze bust-portrait, which entered the VIVE collections in 2020, is the only known case of bust-portraits of Pio V: a new critical reading has confirmed that it belongs to Guglielmo Della Porta, a leading figure in sculpture in late 16th century Rome.

Cristina Conti received her doctorate from the University of Rome ‘Tor Vergata’ and is currently a research fellow at the University of Turin. Her scientific production includes the editing, together with Maria Beltramini, of the volume Antonio da Sangallo il Giovane: architettura e decorazione da Leone X a Paolo III (2018), the articles dedicated to Raphael's pupils in Rome, on the young Perino del Vaga (2019), on Polidoro da Caravaggio (2022), on Giovan Francesco Penni (2024), and the research campaign on Pellegrino da Modena (2024).

After completing her doctorate at the University of Turin, Clara Seghesio is now a research fellow at the same university. She has to her credit several contributions dedicated to the history of sculpture in the modern age between Rome and the Piedmontese and northern context, with a particular focus on the portrait genre. She is currently working on the French sculptor Barthélemy Prieur and on the drafting of a monographic volume on late 16th century sculpture in the Piedmontese context

Free admission subject to availability.

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