Church of Sant'Antonio Abate

Gorgeous

Beautiful and full of artistic treasures.

Beautiful little church in the center of moncalvo ... in the middle of the ancient "fracia" way to go by foot ...

You will find many paintings by Guglielmo and Orsola Caccia,

The visit is valid for the important works of Guglielmo and Orsola Caccia. Before 1459 there was an oratory dedicated to Saint Anthony the Abbot, which became the seat of the brotherhood of the Disciplinants with the title of the most holy Peter and John the Baptist. The church, rebuilt on the same site in 1623, was a parish church from 1623 to 1783. It was then abandoned due to the stench of corpses buried underground. The sacristy was built in 1700. In 1705 the staircase with balustrade of the presbytery was built. The bell tower was started in 1719 and finished in 1744. In the middle of the century. XVIII date the first two side altars and six frontal altarpieces in tripartite scagliola by Francesco Solari (dated between 1752 and 1756). The building has a seventeenth-century structure. The facade, facing north, houses three plaster statues: above St. Anthony the Abbot, below St. Peter and St. John the Baptist. The high bell tower is separated from the right side of the church; at the base there is the inscription «1719 | AIAGO. " The interior is classroom; in the deep apse there are the wooden choir and the marble high altar of 1734; it has a tripartite scagliola frontal with a radiant monstrance attributed to Francesco Solari (1739). The current balustrade of the presbytery is coeval with the main altar. Two large seventeenth-century paintings depicting La cena in Emmaus and La lavanda dei piedi have been placed on the walls of the presbytery. The wooden choir is surmounted on the back wall by a large modern Crucifix in glazed polychrome ceramic (20th century). The altars of the six side chapels have stylistically homogeneous frontals of scagliola, referable to the brothers Francesco and Cristoforo Solari and to the years 1752-56. To the right: a) S. Francesco da Paola, altar erected around 1743, frontal in scagliola dated 1756, with the coat of arms of the Rubini family; stucco riser from 1780; canvas depicting the saints Francesco da Paola, Vincenzo Ferreri, Bartholomew, Thomas Aquinas and the blessed Alessandro Sauli (1725?), by Ferdinando Pozzo b) altar of San Carlo, frontal in scagliola with the Purging Souls, signed "Solarius fecit anno 1755", by Francesco Solari; canvas depicting San Carlo Borromeo, a well-kept late work by Moncalvo c) Madonna del Carmine, frontal by Francesco Solari (1752) with sign of the Carmine company; canvas depicting the Madonna del Carmine with the Child on the throne supported by clouds, between angels, the saints Simone Stok and Giovanni Battista, by Moncalvo and a wooden statue of the Madonna (1728) by Giuseppe Termine. To the left: a) Saint Agatha, from 1658; frontal in scagliola, depicting Saint Lucia in the center and with the inscription at the base: «egentibus D. D. Octavio Rivetta ac Angelo Franĉo Rubino»; canvas representing Saints Liberata, Agata and Lucia, by Orsola Caccia (1637) b) Sant'Anna, an antependium, with the image of Saint Anna, Mary child and Saint Elizabeth, and at the base the writing: «cattarina» (?); altarpiece with the Madonna and Child with Saint Anna, already attributed to Orsola Caccia, but by Moncalvo, at most with some help from his daughter (2nd decade of the 17th century) c) SS. Crucifix or of Our Lady of Sorrows, altar blessed in 1753.

Small seventeenth-century church with a single room with side chapels that have minor altars of considerable artistic value, with frontals in decorated scagliola, while the central altar with wooden choir in the apse part is in marble. The side altars also have some altarpieces by the painter Guglielmo Caccia, known as Moncalvo.

Typical and ancient church of the 600 in Moncalvo, Monferrato in the main artery of the city center that climbs from the foot of the village to the top. It is worth seeing for the works contained inside, altarpieces by Guglielmo Caccia and his daughter Orsola. There is therefore an altarpiece depicting S. Francesco di Paola with other saints which is almost a rarity in Piedmont but you know, the saints ... and their venerators ... Curiosity is the fact that inside the church right at the entrance of the sacristy near the main altar there are two statues depicting a S Antonio Abate or pigs, with the iconized animal at the foot of the saint, and another depicting S. Anthony of Padua.