Thursday, October 29, 2020

VICTOR EMMANUEL MONUMENT

Piazza Venezia

 1885/1905 Giuseppe Sacconi (1854/1905)

Sacconi won the national competition of 1884, after the results of the international competition of 1882 had been revoked: the winning project had been by the French Henri-Paul Nénot and the monument was originally supposed to be built in the area of ​​today's Piazza dei Cinquecento

Sacconi had designed it to be built with travertine limestone but in 1889 a commission decided the use of Botticino marble from Brescia

The works were continued by Gaetano Koch (1849/1910), Pio Piacentini (1846/1928) and Manfredo Manfredi (1859/1627) after Sacconi’s death in 1905

It was inaugurated on June 4, 1911

Here in 1921 the Unknown Soldier of World War I was buried. Since then the monument would be called Vittoriano, whereas previously it was only known as Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II or Altar of the Fatherland

The decorations were completed only in 1927 with the two bronze quadrigas

Finally the monument was completed in the years 1924/35 by Armando Brasini (1879/1965) with the definition of the interior including the CRYPT OF THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER decorated with mosaics by Giulio Bargellini (1896/1936) and the construction of the FAÇADE ON VIA DI S. PIETRO IN CARCERE

IRON GATE by Manfredo Manfredi. It can slide underground

Enormous size:

135 meters wide, 130 deep and 81 high (443 x 426 x 266 feet)

The Statue of Liberty in New York is 46.5 m (151 feet) high without the pedestal, a little more than half of the Vittoriano

The monument is decorated with about one hundred works by major artists of the Italian academic sculptural scene of the end of the nineteenth century and of the beginning of the twentieth century

On the left "Fountain of the Adriatic Sea" by Emilio Quadrelli

On the right "Fountain of the Tyrrhenian Sea" by Pietro Canonica (1869/1959)

QUADRIGAS

1924/27 on the left "Unity" by Carlo Fontana (1865/1956) and on the right "Freedom" by Paolo Bartolini (1859/1930)

TWO BRONZE GROUPS representing "Values ​​of the Italians":

On the left "Thought" by Giulio Monteverde (1837/1917)

On th right "Action" by Francesco Jerace (1854/1937)

FOUR MARBLE GROUPS representing "Values ​​of the Italians":

On the left "Strenght" by Augusto Rivalta (1837/1925) and "Concord" by Ludovico Pogliaghi (1857/1950)

On the right "Sacrifice" by Leonardo Bistolfi (1859/1933) and "Law" by Ettore Ximenes (1855/1926)

WINGED LIONS along the staircase

Giuseppe Tonnini (1875/1954)

WOMEN REPRESENTING VICTORIES ON ROSTRA

Edoardo De Albertis (1874/1950) and Edoardo Rubino (1871/1954)

WOMEN REPRESENTING VICTORIES ON TRIUMPHAL COLUMNS

1911, originally golden, 3.70 m (12.13 feet) high including the sphere

From left to right: Nicola Cantalamessa Papotti (1833/1910), Adolfo Apolloni (1855/1923), Mario Rutelli (1859/1943) and Arnaldo Zocchi (1851/1922)

SIXTEEN STATUES representing "Italian Regions" above the sixteen columns of the portico

Executed at the end of the nineteenth century

Series of vegetable symbols carved with various allegorical meanings: palm (victory), oak (strength), laurel (bravery, victorious peace), myrtle (sacrifice), olive (peace, harmony)

MOSAICS IN INTERNAL LUNETTES

On the left "Faith, Force, Work, Wisdom" by Giulio Bargellini (1896/1936)

On the right "Law, Bravery, Peace, Unity" by Antonio Rizzi (1869/1940)

On either side of the access door to the porch, under the right propylaeum, two allegorical statues "Sculpture" and "Painting" 1910 by Lio Gangeri (1845/1913)

Also works by Enrico Butti (1847/1932) and Cesare Zocchi (1851/1922)

Altare della Patria

Altar of the Fatherland

"Statue of the Goddess Rome" and marble frieze "Triumph Work and Triumph of Patriotism" 1909/1925 by Angelo Zanelli (1879/1942)

Equestrian statue of Victor Emmanuel II

1888/1901 by Enrico Chiaradia (1851/1901). It was completed after Chiaradia’s death by Emilio Gallori (1846/1924)

Base with friezes representing "Fourteen Italian cities which once had been capital cities or maritime republics" by Eugenio Maccagnani (1852/1930)

The statue is 12 m (39.3 feet) high and 10 m (32.8 feet) long, the king is 16 times larger than life, the weight is 50 tonnes (55 tons), a horse hoof is 60 cm (2 feet)

It's so big that when it was placed in its place, in order to celebrate, a lunch was offered by the smelter G.B. Bastianelli inside the belly of the horse with waiters and twenty-one people who ate, comfortably seated and lit by bulbs

Sanctuary of the Flags of the Armed Forces

Entry on the left side of the monument

Museo Centrale del Risorgimento

Central Museum of the Risorgimento

Paintings, sculptures, drawings, engravings, prints, weapons

Sections of the museum:

The Napoleonic period

The Congress of Vienna

The Revolutions of 1820/21 and 1830/31

Giuseppe Mazzini and the Giovine Italia (Young Italy)

Pius IX Mastai-Ferretti (1846/78)

1848: the Five Days of Milan; the Republic of St. Mark; the War of Independence

1849 and the Roman Republic

Cavour and the Crimean War

Victor Emmanuel II and the Second War of Independence

Garibaldi and the Expedition of the One Thousand Soldiers

From the Unification until the Aspromonte incident

The Third War of Independence

1870 the taking of Porta Pia

World War I

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