SAN QUIRICO D’ORCIA THE INLAYS THAT CHARMED FEDERICO ZERI
FEDERICO ZERI, ONE OF THE WORLD’S LEADING EXPERTS, STUDIED HISTORY OF ART IN THE COLLEGIATA OF SAN QUIRICO D’ORCIA IN FRONT OF A MASTERPIECE THAT IS STILL THERE
Antonio Barili San Quirico d’Orcia choir inlays in the Collegiata
by Donatella Cinelli Colombini #winedestination
As you know, I produce wine but I did not study oenology but rather the history of medieval art. I consider it a privilege to have dedicated years to the study of paintings, sculptures and minor arts but I also feel the privilege of living in Tuscany, a region that resembles an immense widespread museum, full of great works of art.
FEDERICO ZERI IN SAN QUIRICO D’ORCIA
Here I’ll tell you about one of them: the inlays by Antonio Barili in San Quirico d’Orcia, 30 km from Fattoria del Colle. During the last Orcia Wine Festival I met Marco Torchi who told me about Federico Zeri, one of the greatest Italian art historians and critics, who decided his destiny while he was in San Quirico d’Orcia.
Gruff, brilliant, highly cultured, he created the largest art photo library in the world. His interpretation of the visual arts left a strong mark forcing everyone, even those who didn’t think like him, to take his opinions into account.
In his memoirs he tells how in 1941 he was called to arms and sent to Florence to join the light artillery. Zeri did not share <<any of the goals or ‘ideals’ that should have justified the war>> and because of this <<I became very thin and fell ill with pleurisy>> they first treated him in Florence and then he was <<transferred to the small village in Val d’Orcia>> and was placed in Palazzo Chigi Zondadari<< everything was still intact with the leaded glass, the walls of compressed Cordoba leather. I remember that there were also some paintings and furniture. And the most curious fact was that no one stole, no one took away even a pin, even though the building was open to everyone>>.
PALAZZO CHIGI ZONDADARI AND THE COLLEGIATA IN SAN QUIRICO D’ORCIA
Unfortunately, the integrity of the building was short-lived <<it was then completely devastated first by the military and then later by bombs>>. But while convalescent Zeri experienced a real cultural rebirth here << next to the Palazzo, where we slept on straw on the floor, there was the Collegiata Church of San Quirico d’Orcia and I saw a work of art there that shocked me and which still exists today, fortunately. They are the inlays of the choir. Choir originally created for the Cathedral of Siena by Barili and which was later dismantled and dispersed. It seems to me that seven pieces are today in San Quirico d’Orcia. Strangely, I found in these inlays, from the end of the fifteenth century, the same spirit that hovers in certain metaphysical paintings by De Chirico. This was exactly the meeting that changed my life>>
Wow. We don’t imagine that Antonio Barili could have such an effect.
ANTONIO BARILI’S INLAYS IN THE CHOIR OF THE COLLEGIATA IN SAN QUIRICO D’ORCIA
His inlays are still today behind the high altar of the Collegiata Church of Saints Quirico and Giulitta in San Quirico d’Orcia. They were made between 1483 and 1504 for the Chapel of San Giovanni Battista in the Cathedral of Siena. Originally there were 19 panels but they deteriorated quickly and in 17th century they were dismantled and removed. In 1664 the Marquis Flavio Chigi purchased the 7 best preserved panels and in 1979 they were placed inside the Collegiata Church. Another of the panels, with Barili’s self-portrait, is in the Museum of Craft Art in Vienna, while the others have been lost.
I hope you will go and see the Collegiata Church, a small Gothic jewel (13th century) in travertine inside San Quirico along what in the Middle Ages was the Via Francigena that connected Northern Europe to Rome.
Inside there are other things to see and above all the splendid Madonna with Children and Saints by Sano di Pietro (1470) and the tomb of Henry of Nassau (1451), founder of the ruling family of Holland.
Also in San Quirico there is the Renaissance garden of the Horti Leonini (16th century) and the path along the walls dotted with flowers and contemporary sculptures. Not far away are the famous cypress trees, the church of Vitaleta, the winding road of Monticchiello and of course Bagno Vignoni, the only medieval spa centre still preserved.
This is why it is a privilege to live in the Tuscan countryside and it is not surprising that Federico Zeri, despite coming from Rome, was struck by San Quirico d’Orcia.