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Caravaggio (Bergamo, Italy): Church of Santa Liberata
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 The oratory was built at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Originally it was probably dedicated to the Saints Catherine and Lucia and the change of dedication took place following a vow aimed at averting a plague or freeing the village from one in progress.
The small church was the suburban church of the peasants who lived outside the town walls on that side of the town.
The central plan reflects the architectural fashion of that era, linked to the passage of Bramante in Lombardy.
The oratory has a hexagonal structure. From the outside it appears more imposing than it really is due to the presence of a portico on the three southern sides and the fact that houses are attached to the church on the other three sides.
The interior reflects the exterior and is therefore also hexagonal. The roof is vaulted with lunettes, with a Visconti radiant sun containing the Christogram in the center. Of the six lunettes, the one above the entrance is occupied by a window (two other rectangular windows are present on the walls at the sides of the entrance), the one in front of it is absent because it corresponds to the apse and the remaining four are occupied by valuable frescoes of the sixteenth century depicting pairs of apostles bearing scrolls with verses from the Creed.
The walls are decorated only with stylized stars. Between the walls and the dome there is a double frame in terracotta, with between the two frames a thick band decorated with stylized plant elements.
The apse is polygonal and it too has a vaulted ceiling with lunettes. The altar and the retable are in carved wood and constitute the only element out of context of the oratory, as they date back to the seventeenth century. The retable has an architectural structure, with two twisted columns decorated with golden vine shoots supporting a broken tympanum. The altarpiece between the two columns, made in 1674, depicts a Virgin and Child with three saints. The identity of the latters could not be determined with certainty.
Every year on the evening of January 18, the church hosts a Eucharistic celebration and the neighboring streets are filled with stalls, lights, food stands.
Categories: Places of historical value of artistic value
Via Santa Liberata, 27, 24043 Caravaggio BG |
Further pictures of Church of Santa Liberata in the section Photography |