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A Little Seventeenth-Century Oratory

This is a very small chapel, but you wouldn't know it: the altar and its theatrical backdrop dominate this intimate prayer space.

[image ALT: missingALT. It is a stucco reredos of the Baptism of Jesus in the church of S. Giovanni Battista in Spello, Umbria (central Italy).]

The best work in the church is the late 17c reredos of the Baptism of Jesus. Of painted plaster possibly with an eye to reminding one of a della Robbia ceramic, stylistically it lies somewhere between baroque and rococo, and is an unusually elegant work. (Which being interpreted: I don't much care for anything after about the 15c, but I like this.)

Newcomers to things iconographic, don't be fooled by the tall figure obviously in command and holding the cross: it is indeed St. John the Baptist, the titular saint of the church. Normally he wears a camel skin, as it says in the Bible; here he doesn't seem to, but if there were any doubt, the shape of the cross is always a tip-off, even if he were not baptizing. When Christ is represented holding a cross, it is almost always the real thing, a blocky lumber cross capable of supporting the weight of a man; whereas St. John almost invariably holds a very thin cross like the one you see here.

One of the lofts on either side, optimistically decorated with angelic musicians: they must have been for instrument players and choristers. The symmetrical lofts suggest Vivaldi and antiphonal music, and this church would be a very good place for chamber music concerts.

Images with borders lead to more information.
The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)

Thanks to the Pinacoteca Civica di Spello

for opening to the general public all the minor churches and monuments in town as part of their excellent Aug 1997 program, "Viviamo la nostra città";
for staffing each of them with student guides, often enthusiastic and sometimes very knowledgeable;
and for providing careful fact sheets, authored by Stefano Felicetti and Giulio Proietti Bocchini, from which I drew much of the detailed information you see here about this church.

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