Why Siena is not Chartres. Functions and forms of painted architecture in the lower church
by Fulvio Cervini
Colourful capitals and fictional elements in the lower church propose an architectural polychromy quite different from that covers the French contemporary cathedrals, i.e. Amiens and Chartres. In Siena, the architectural colour strengthens the taste for the antique and is inspired by a tradition extended from Rome to Lombardy. The buildings represented in the narrative scenes dialogue with the precious arts and also corroborate an idea of architecture balanced between classicism and innovation. The solutions developed by Guido da Siena and his workshop are decisive to define the space and propose an idea of architecture that incorporates some words of the gothic rayonnant lexicon of northern France and updates tuscan and italian style in the last decades of the thirteenth century. Not a ‘resistance’, but a ‘response’ to the French Gothic,nourished of colour and imagination.

For a reinterpretation of the iconographic cycle under the Duomo of Siena, with some integrations
by Irene Samassa
In 2003 Alessandro Bagnoli published the first ritten observations on the mural paintings that decorate the space placed under the Duomo of Siena. In his essay, the scholar analyzes the frescoes from an historical and artistic perspective, identifying the different hands within the painting as well as the majority of the scenes represented. In order to make it possible to understand the fresco cycles in their entirety, the present research aims to interpret the scenes that are yet to be identified, and therefore analyze the complex iconography of the two cycles by means of a comparison with eminent Old and New Testament paintings that could have influenced the narrative choices of the painters. Furthermore, the research tries to study the configuration of the space under the Duomo back to its possible original function, through the analysis of historical, documentary, archaeological and architectural data.

A new reading of the 13th century cycle in the lower church of the Duomo of Siena in the perspective of Duccio’s Maestà
by Andrea De Marchi
The iconographic programme of the mural paintings with episodes from the New Testament by Guido da Siena and assistants, uncovered between 1997 and 2001 in a room underneath the high altar of the Duomo of Siena, can be integrated with hypotheses concerning the faces of the two octagonal pillars, covered by buttresses. The narrative sequences of Duccio’s Maestà are clearly dependent on this cycle,that was sacrificed in 1308, the same year the duccesque altarpiece was commissioned, when the building of a baptistery at a lower level attached to this room, in view of the enlargement of the cathedral,was decided. The comparison unequivocally highlights the absence of three important Byzantine feasts,the Transfiguration, the Raising of Lazarus and the Entry into Jerusalem. These subjects are present on a textile antependium, painted by Guido, in the Pinacoteca Nazionale of Siena. Its provenance can be hypothesized as from the altar of the aforementioned room, the walls covered in mural paintings, formerly misinterpreted as a crypt, that should instead be considered a proper lower church and a monumental entrance from the city centre. In this way, the antependium completed the Christological cycle with its otherwise missing triumphal aspect, in counterpoint with the tryptych of the Passion on the back wall, focused not on the Crucifixion, but on the Deposition of Christ.

The lost Annunciation of the Cathedral of Siena. Some hypothesis on the group placed against the altar pillars by Gabriele Fattorini
In the center of the Cathedral of Siena, during the fourteenth century, the Sienese showed reverence not only to Duccio’s Maestà and to the altarpieces of the four patronal altars (painted by Simone Martini and Lippo Memmi, the brothers Ambrogio and Pietro Lorenzetti, and Bartolomeo Bulgarini), but also to a group of the Annunciation, made by two wooden and polychrome figures. The couple of sculptures enjoyed a great devotion for a long time, but went lost in the first half of the Cinquecento. This paper attemps to trace the history of the Annunciation and make some assumptions about its appearance, relying on the fact that, according to a habit ingrained over the centuries, even in Siena the most worshiped images were usually replicated faithfully or in the form of variations.

The «chappello» of Duccio and «tre agnoletti […] i quali discendono a ministrare la santa messa»
by Gianluigi Simone
In 1375, on the main altar of the sienese cathedral was added a canopy, hanging above Duccio’s Maestà. Although it no longer exists, is reconstructable from documents and visual testimonies: it had the function of making the eucharistic rite more spectacular through the descent of three Angels bearing Sacrament, ampules and corporal. In 1454 an unrealized project involved the creation of a monumental eucharistic custody to be placed on the altar, flanked by several others silver statues: this early interest in the enhancement of the Sacrament has to be connect with the attempts - only partly succeeded - carried out by Antonino Pierozzi, archibishop of Florence, to place the eucharistic custody of the florentine cathedral on the main altar. Only in 1506, however, the bronze tabernacle of Lorenzo Vecchietta took the place of Duccio’s Maestà in the sienese cathedral, layding down the primacy of the Eucharist over all other forms of devotion.

Looking at the frescoes in the lower Basilica of Assisi
by Ruggero de Grisogono
New remarks may allow a better understanding of the oldest frescoes on the walls of the nave of St. Francis lower Church in Assisi. These paintings, executed around mid-13th century, were, soon thereafter, surprisingly damaged because of the opening of side chapels. The painting of the frescoes was very close to a dramatic turning point of Franciscan history, that is to say, the resignation of Giovanni da Parma, 7th general minister, the subsequent election of Buonaventura da Bagnoregio; Giovanni, charged by the new general minister with a crime of heresy, would have incurred a very heavy condemnation in the process in Città della Pieve without the courageous intervention of cardinal Ottobono Fieschi. The core of the program presents five essential scenes of St. Francis’ life (south wall), facing five scenes of the Passion of Christ (north wall). Francis is presented as a mirror of Christ, because of his form of life, so close to Jesus himself. The figure of Francis experiencing his mysterious La Verna vision was obliterated. The importance of the scene however persists in the extraordinary gesture of surprise of the Telamon identified nearby. Close to the right of the Telamon, one can see the stigmatized hand of Francis with a calyx. Another hand is to be found at the beginning of the S wall. It’s the same left hand of Francis, without stigma. St. Francis welcomes the pilgrims inviting them to understand the true meaning of his life as mirror of Christ, culminating as Alter Christus receiving the seal of stigmata. The full energy transmitted by Jesus Christ to Francis emerges from the Undressing of Christ (north wall)towards the Undressing of Francis, it was recognized and reaffirmed around 1320 by Simone Martini’s Undressing of St. Martin of Tours within the side chapel.

Doubts about two famous portraits attributed to Leonardo
by Renato Barilli
For some times I have serious doubts that two portraits now firmly attributed to Leonardo are really his hand. I am referring to the famous Lady with an Ermine and La belle Ferronnière. From a philological point of view, it must take note that Vasari, the biographer still more reliable, makes no mention of the one nor the other portrait. The second appears in the memoirs of a Lombard humanist at the Sforza court, Bellincioni, but he merely states that there is a portrait commissioned from Leonardo by the Duke directly, dedicated to Cecilia Gallerani, his young lover, but does not mention a reason noteworthy that the ermine presence. As for the other portrait, there is no trace, in all the critical literature of the past, of an attribution to Leonardo. Instead, there is, especially in the first decades of the last century, almost unanimous attribution to Boltraffio, and therefore slippage in the repertoire of Leonardo could be considered as a kind of lectio facilior, or undue attraction in favor of a great master against a lower considered author. Turning to stylistic reasons, both paintings appear to us enclosed in a clear definition of the profiles, with total denial than the typical trait of sfumato of Leonardo, that just in the Milan years was in full swing. Moreover, the same structure of the faces is rounded, while the artist, in the few cases safe, seems to prefer a flared shape that opens upwards.