The architectural and artistic presence in Milan represents one of the attractions of the Lombard capital. Milan has been among the most important Italian centers in the history of architecture, has made important contributions to the development of art history, and has been the cradle of a number of modern art movements.
History
Gothic style
The Milanese Gothic style was an urban artistic movement at the turn of the second half of the 13th century and the first half of the 15th century that was initially introduced into Milanese territory by Cistercian monks. It was the main artistic style of the vast patronage and self-celebrating agenda of the Viscontis, lords of Milan, whose rule over the city is usually associated with the Milanese Gothic period.
The conventional date of the beginning of the Gothic period in the territory of the lordship of Milan is often given as the Visconti family's rise to power in 1282.. Thus, the penetration of the new artistic trends from beyond the Alps came later than in central Italy, where Cistercian Gothic had already produced almost a century earlier the Abbey of Fossanova (1187) and the Abbey of Casamari (1203).. This delay in the introduction of the Gothic style in the Milanese area can be explained by the strong and deep-rooted presence of Romanesque architecture, also by virtue of the link between this architecture and the Empire, which was not by chance overcome only with the new political course of the Visconti seigniory..
The date, however, is only indicative since the first example of Gothic appeared in Milan by Cistercian monks in the first half of the 13th century: in 1221 the abbey of Chiaravalle was consecrated by Bishop Enrico Settala. At the same time, however, the Gothic style did not spread noticeably in the area, moreover with stylistic features strongly influenced by Romanesque, until the work of Azzone Visconti between 1329 and 1339, who introduced artists from Pisa and Florence to his court...
The dense agenda of support for the arts inaugurated by Azzone Visconti was continued by his successor Bernabò Visconti, but above all by Gian Galeazzo: under his lordship the largest Italian Gothic building site for the construction of the new city cathedral was inaugurated. For this work, which in the duke's mind would have been monumental and grandiose, architects and artists from all over Europe were called to Milan: the continuous exchange between local and foreign workers helped to bring to maturity the Lombard Gothic style, which before then had been anchored to the strong Romanesque heritage, creating a synthesis between Italian and European Gothic architecture...
After a setback due to a turbulent political period after the death of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Milan's artistic splendor resumed vigor under Filippo Maria Visconti, who in the first half of the 15th century transformed the Milanese court into one of the major centers of Italian humanism, calling to his service such personalities as Francesco Filelfo, Pier Candido Decembrio, Gasparino Barzizza and Antonio da Rho. In the last years of the Visconti seigniory, similarly to what happened in Florence, there were then the first hints of the new Renaissance art with the work of Masolino da Panicale in Castiglione Olona..
The end of the Gothic period is thus indicatively made to coincide with the collapse of the Visconti seigniory in 1447, with a late Gothic style that would be grafted onto the early central Italian Renaissance period giving rise to the Lombard Renaissance...
Art of the sixteenth century
The Milanese art scene of the second half of the 16th century must be analyzed by considering the particular position of the city: while for the Spanish Empire it represented a strategic military outpost, from the religious point of view it was at the center of the conflict between the Catholic and Reformed Churches. Consequently, the greatest contribution was made by religious art in the face of less civil artistic and architectural production.. While in adopting the Mannerist style the city's patrons and artists had as a point of reference examples of central-Italian derivation, the city's location near Protestant Switzerland made Milan one of the main centers of the flowering and elaboration of Counter-Reformation art, thanks to the widespread action of St. Charles Borromeo....
Domenico Giunti from Tuscany and Galeazzo Alessi from Perugia were the first architects to break away from the Lombard late Renaissance tradition. To the former are due the church of San Paolo Converso and the church of Sant'Angelo, set according to the same construction scheme of a single nave with side chapels with a barrel-vaulted roof, a citation of Alberti's Basilica of Sant'Andrea already found in Bramante's church of Santa Maria presso San Satiro... Vincenzo Seregni's first work in Milan, excluding his apprenticeship in the Fabbrica del Duomo, was instead in the reconstruction of the church of San Vittore al Corpo in a collaboration with Alessi. Alessi continued in his Counter-Reformation program with the construction of the new church of San Barnaba for the Barnabite fathers, an order that had recently been created to encourage the spread of the Tridentine doctrine: the single-nave interior layout can be considered one of the first attempts at a "basilica of the Reformation.".
In the Counter-Reformation agenda of Cardinal Charles Borromeo in the city of Milan, there was also the intention to bring to the city the company of Jesuits that he had gotten to know in his Roman sojourns: the cardinal placed their headquarters in the old church of San Fedele, which proved inadequate for Borromeo's propaganda, so Pellegrino Tibaldi was commissioned to construct a new building. The church of Santa Maria presso San Celso was begun in the 15th century, but much of its appearance is due to plans made from 1570 onward.. Among the various renovations of old churches was that of the Garegnano Charterhouse, with the addition of the portico and the design of a new facade starting in 1573 under the direction of Vincenzo Seregni.. Martino Bassi's most important works also include the reconstruction in classicist forms of the dome of the Basilica of San Lorenzo, which collapsed in 1573..
The project for the completion of the construction site of Santa Maria della Passione, involving Martino Bassi, dates back to 1576.. The church of San Carlo al Lazzaretto was commissioned by Charles Borromeo in 1580 from Pellegrino Tibaldi, although in fact the work was supervised by Giuseppe Meda. Construction of the church of San Sebastiano began in 1577 as thanksgiving to the saint for the end of the plague. The church of San Raffaele, built starting in 1579, is attributable to Tibaldi, in which the decorations with sculpted herms in the lower order stand out. The church of Santa Maria al Paradiso was built on an old Franciscan convent: construction started in 1590 and was already completed in 1604. Finally, Cardinal Borromeo had a hand in bringing Milan Cathedral into line with the new Tridentine norms, thus giving a boost to the work on the building.
The building site of Palazzo Marino introduced Galeazzo Alessi to Milan: it is surely the architect's most famous city work, and the palace is regarded as Milan's most representative Mannerist civil architecture. Other famous building sites of the second half of the sixteenth century in Milan include the renovation of Villa Simonetta and the constructions of Palazzo dei Giureconsulti, Casa degli Omenoni, Palazzo Arcivescovile, Palazzo Erba Odescalchi, and the rebuilding of the Palazzo Reale.
Already in the early Renaissance Milanese craftsmen were among the most highly regarded in Europe, yet the heyday of the decorative arts in the city came during the early Spanish rule. One of the leading areas of Milanese craftsmanship was armor, the workmanship of which far exceeded that of other European manufactures. The fame of the Milanese armorers was such that their works were considered a real status symbol among nobles throughout Europe, despite the fact that other foreign states had established their own workshops, such as in Innsbruck, Augsburg or Greenwich; among the best craftsmen of the second half of the sixteenth century stand out above all Lucio Marliani known as the Piccinino and Giovanni Battista Panzeri known as the Zarabaglia, both belonging to well-known families of armorers..
In order to conclude the discussion of the Milanese artistic situation of the late sixteenth century, it is worth mentioning briefly a phenomenon long reputed to be marginal and underground, reevaluated only since the last decade of the twentieth century, which has made it possible to classify the experience of the "Rabisch," as the adherents of the group were also called, as a parallel phenomenon to the counter-reformed art of the time to which one can refer as "alternative classicism." The reevaluation moved the activity of the Accademia dei Facchini della Val di Blenio from a purely goliardic and recreational role to a cultural movement that, with its "anti-intellectualist attitude" and the idea of art "as free creation," anticipated themes that would be taken up centuries later in Romanticism and Scapigliatura..
Baroque
Due to the work of the Borromeo cardinals and its importance in the Italian, at first Spanish and then Austrian dominions, in a period between the seventeenth century and the first half of the eighteenth century, Milan experienced a lively artistic period during which it assumed the role of a driving center of the Lombard Baroque, of which the Milanese BaroqueDepending on the texts consulted, one finds this definition, as well as the term "Milanese Baroque." The term used, however, should not lead one to consider the artistic period as minor or to the absence of an artistic school in the city. In fact, the style that later spread homogeneously throughout Lombardy started from Milan: for this reason, the term "Lombard Baroque" is considered more correct to characterize the local art school, thus speaking of "Baroque in Milan" was the dominant movement.
The Milanese Baroque period can be divided into three parts: the early seventeenth century, the second seventeenth century, and the eighteenth century. The early seventeenth century began with the appointment of Federico Borromeo as bishop of Milan in 1595. in continuity with the work of his cousin Charles: in this first phase the main exponents of Milanese painting were three, Giovan Battista Crespi, known as Cerano, Giulio Cesare Procaccini and Pier Francesco Mazzucchelli, known as Morazzone. In this first phase, the evolution of the new Baroque style followed with continuity the late Mannerist art widespread in Milan at the time of Charles Borromeo; in fact, the training of the three painters took place on the models of late Tuscan and Roman Mannerism for Cerano and Morazzone, while Procaccini was trained on Emilian models. From the architectural point of view, religious commissions dominated the scene, since Spanish rule cared more about works of military rather than civilian utility;. many pre-existing churches were completely rebuilt and decorated in Baroque style, and as many built from scratch:. while the Baroque style was introduced in Milan by Lorenzo Binago, two other main architects shared the scene at the time, namely Fabio Mangone, with more classical lines and for this reason often chosen for commissions by Federico Borromeo,. and Francesco Maria Richini known simply as il Richini, with lines more inspired by the early Roman Baroque.. Having overcome this dualism, Richini represents the greatest figure of architect in seventeenth-century Milan, and to find again such a prestigious figure in Milanese architecture one would have to wait until the advent of Giuseppe Piermarini.