Borghese Gallery in Rome shows an unprecedented exhibition of Bernini masterpieces

The gallery has already organized a Bernini exhibition once before, when it reopened in 1998 after a lengthy renovation. Then, there were loans from other institutions among exhibits. Later on, there was a display built on the Borghese collection only. It fleshed out the artist’s individual career from his apprenticeship with his father, the sculptor Pietro Bernini (this life episode Gian Lorenzo "would later try to expunge," the curators said). The latest display showed a series of sculptures they crafted in collaboration as well as Gian’s independent artworks at the time when his ambition pushed him to become an all-around artist, adding architecture and painting to his already considerable skills.

The marble portraits cover a 60-year period during which Bernini made a kind of a city directory "Who's Who" in Rome. The Louvre lent its bust of Cardinal Richelieu (see above), whom Bernini never met. He made the statue from a painting, something the curator Andrea Bacchi said was both an innovation and a challenge. "He wrote that it was hard enough to give the warmth and life of people to marble, but doing it without ever meeting the person is nigh-on impossible," the art historian commented.

The artist’s fame in his lifetime and even beyond it has made him a much-studied figure. Mr. Bacchi said that "Bernini is synonymous with the Baroque

The baroque style replaced the Renaissance, and it sought to shock the soul, in contrast to the Renaissance art, which kept the distance between an artwork and the audience. It surely succeeded: the pictorial pearls of those times are the true treasures. Read more

and the Baroque

The baroque style replaced the Renaissance, and it sought to shock the soul, in contrast to the Renaissance art, which kept the distance between an artwork and the audience. It surely succeeded: the pictorial pearls of those times are the true treasures. Read more

with Bernini."

Nonetheless, the Borghese exhibition provides new ideas for the research, and offers an opportunity to closely compare works that are placed usually thousands of miles apart, like two versions of the "Crucified Christ" lent by institutions in Madrid and Toronto.

Above left: Gian Lorenzo Bernini, The Crucified Christ (Corpus), ca. 1655. Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), Toronto
Above right: Gian Lorenzo Bernini, The Crucified Christ (Corpus), ca. 1654−56. Palácio Real de Madrid

Restoration work preceding the exhibition also led to discoveries. For example, the museum received a Bernini statue of St. Bibiana for restoration removed from its church. The sculpture had once been taken from its place before, during the bombing of Rome in World War II. Now the restoration — which cost 62,000 euros, or about $72,000 — suggested that it had probably been mounted incorrectly on its return.

Anna Coliva promised that once the exhibition is over, she tries to find funds to build a new altar for the church, so that the statue can be admired from the viewpoint Bernini had intended.

The sculptor worked throughout Rome, and it’s clear that curators couldn’t move his monumental works like the sculptures in the Four Rivers Fountain in Piazza Navona (above) or in St. Peter’s Basilica (see Saint Longinus bellow). But they came up with a great idea: they gathered a series of models and sketches of such pieces, showing Bernini’s process of working.

Written on materials of The New York Times. Title illustration: Gian Lorenzo Bernini, detail of "Apollo and Daphne" at the Borghese Gallery, Rome. Photo: via pinimg.com.