Following up on some recent posts about the cathedral of St Lawrence in Genoa and its museum (museum part 1; part 2; cathedral), here are some pictures from the diocesan museum. This first part will focus on paintings and altar frontals. Genoa is one of the most important ports in Italy, and during its time as an independent republic, was a major cloth importer; much of the material brought to the city was used for making vestments and other ecclesiastical decorations. We start, however, with two very nice paintings of the Virgin Mary, the better to celebrate the octave of the Assumption.
The Madonna and Child with the Two Lazaruses, ca. 1520, by Pietro Francesco Sacchi, from the church of St Lazarus in Genoa, now demolished. The Lazarus on the left is the brother of Martha and Mary Magdalene, who according to a later medieval tradition, ended his days as the bishop of Marseilles; the other is the leper of the Gospel known as Dives and Lazarus, Luke 16, 19-31.
The Deposition from the Cross, also ca. 1520 by Sacchi; from the church of St Mary and Ss Nazarius and Celsus, the parish church of the Multedo neighborhood.
Two altar frontals.
An altar frontal for Lent and Passiontide, with a central Pietà, and Ss John the Evangelist and Mary Magdalene to either side; Flemish workmanship of the later 16th or early 17th century.
The Communion of St Bonavnture, 1616, by Giovanni Battista Paggi (1554-1627).
Two paintings by local artists Antonio Semino (ca. 1485 - after 1547) and Teramo Piaggio (died before 1562); the Depositiom from the Cross...
The Crucifixion, by Luca Cambiaso, 1560
The Adoration of the Magi, by Giambattista Perolli, ca. 1567
