Giacinto Calandrucci

Sant'Antonio dei Portoghesi

Giacinto Calandrucci 1646 - 1703

Only a little information can be found on Giacinto Calandrucci who was a Baroque painter and draughtsman born in Palermo in Sicily.

He first studied with fellow Palermitano, Pietro del Pò. He then moved to the Rome studio of Carlo Maratta where he studied and worked for many years.

In 1680 he was responsible for the fresco decorations of The Four Seasons in Palazzo Lante and the mythological fresco decorations in the gallery of Palazzo Muti-Papazzurri.

His altarpieces can be found in churches around Rome with an altarpiece attributed to him in Santa Maria in Traspontina.

Giacinto Calandrucci Art in Rome
Santa Maria in Traspontina
Sant'Antonio dei Portoghesi
San Bonaventura
San Paolo della Regola
Santa Maria dell'Orto

San Clemente

where: Via Labicana, 95
open: 9:00-12:30 & 15:00-18:00
getting there: a short walk from metro linea B Colosseo towards San Giovanni in Laterano

cost: free to visit the church, tickets can be bought inside the church to visit the excavations below
information: definitely NO photography inside the church

Only a ten minute stroll from the Colosseum is San Clemente, a 12th century minor basilica dedicated to Pope Saint Clement I (who was the third bishop of Rome) and built over the remains of a 4th century church and the ruins of an alleyway, house, and mithraeum from the 1st century. 

In the 18th century Pope Clement XI commissioned a new facade and the restorations of the church began. Some of the gilded ceilings, paintings, stuccoes and frescoes date from this period.

Above the nave, in between the windows, are fresco panels by Sebastiano Conca, Giovanni Odazzi, Tommaso Chiari and Pierleone Ghezzi.
The apse mosaics, the Triumph of the Cross, date from the 12th century.

The ceiling fresco panel of the Apotheosis of St Clement is by Giuseppe Chiari.

The Chapel of Our Lady of the Rosary has an altarpiece by Sebastiano Conca depicting Our Lady of the Rosary with Saints Dominic and Catherine of Sienna.

Santa Maria dei Sette Dolori

where: Via Garibaldi, 27 Trastevere

open: the church can be visited during the hotel reception hours

Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows was a 17th century Baroque church and nunnery in Trastevere. Building was started with funds from Donna Camilla Savelli, the wife of Pietro Farnese, Duke of Latera. When the Farnese fell out of favour in Rome, the church and adjoining nunnery's completion was delayed and it was not finished until 1665.

When Donna Camilla was widowed, she spent the rest of her life in the nunnery that she had founded.

Francesco Borromini designed the facade and above the doors of the church are lilies, the emblem of the Farnese family.

Although much of the artwork in this church was sold there is still a beautiful Deposition in the main altar of the church, work by Marco Benefial, and an altarpiece by Carlo Maratta of Saint Augustine.

The convent is now the Hotel Donna Camilla Savelli.