Chiesa di Santa Maria in Casalicchio

Along the road “Valdaso top”, it is the church of Santa Maria in Casalicchio. In past centuries it was a sanctuary. The original church had a single nave and altar facing the people, but only in half of the ‘400, on the left flank, was added a new nave adjoins the former by opening four arches and the elevation of three square pillars. The recent restoration has brought to light three distinct cycles of paintings, executed in different periods from sec. The fifteenth century. XVII and fairly preserved. At the top of the back wall, the painter there had been the “deesis” or great prayer, with the Christ Pantocrator at the center of an almond rainbow, supported by a host of angels; to his right the Madonna with open arms and high, left St. John the Baptist. On either side of the median are two frescoes votive paintings: a holy bishop with miter and pastoral, Mary Anne and child; in the lower one, which comes to earth is a polychrome decoration depicting a cloth, corrugated. The left side shows the “Crucifixion”. Also here, for the opening of the arch communicating with the other aisle it was sacrificed the integrity of the scene of Calvary. In the lunette the right wall, despite the disfiguring window opening, reappeared the animated scene of the “Dormition of the Virgin”, or “Death of the Virgin”. In the middle zone of the same wall, in a fragmentary state, you can admire the triptych depicting votive: in the center, sitting, the “Madonna of the Rose” with the baby in her arms, the sides of the SS. Apostles Bartholomew and James; the far right is painted a Saint Lucia and St. Luke’s on the right side, above the window; in rounds a prophet and the ox as described in Revelation. Soffit Gothic arch and half-pillars that surround the chapel, were painted the “Four Doctors of the Western Church.” The hypothesis is that the series of paintings of Santa Maria in Casalicchio can be traced to an artist of Umbrian culture -marchigiana the first half of the fifteenth century (1444), very close to other artists like Paul from Visso, Nicola of Siena and Fra Martino Angels of Santa Vittoria. In the second decade of the seventeenth century were performed some radical changes, a plaque bears painted, in fact , the date 1612.