We wish Loyola University, one of our university partners, all the best in the NCAA Final Four Tourn

Wewish Loyola University, one of our university partners, all the best in the NCAA Final Four Tournament!

Here you see an illustration of Andrea Pozzo’s portrait of Loyola from the Altar of St. Ignatius in the Chiesa del Gesú in Rome. This image comes from the library’s copy of Pozzo’s Perspectiva pictorum et architectorum Andreae Putei e Societate Jesu, Part 2, published in Rome by Jo. Jacobi Komarek, 1700.

This altar in color is a visual spectacle. The entry in Oxford Art Online states:

In 1695 Pozzo was given one of the most prestigious commissions of the period: the creation of the altar for the tomb of Ignatius Loyola in the left transept of the Gesù. His design was the result of a long-drawn-out competition, in which 12 of his designs contended against those by Sebastiano Cipriani (fl 1696–1733) and Giovanni Battista Origone. An exceptionally large number of sculptors and craftsmen worked on this project, which was supervised by the Jesuit brother Carlo Mauro Bonacina with Pozzo as artistic director. The result was one of the most sumptuous and complex works of altar architecture of the Italian Baroque. The architectural setting of the large wall altar, gently convex, an aedicula with columns and broken pediment, was kept relatively plain but was built from precious materials (e.g. rare marbles, lapis lazuli, precious metals) and embellished with rich sculptural ornament that extended to the surrounding chapel walls. In the centre is a niche for sculpture, which can, alternatively, be covered over with an oil painting by Pozzo. The splendid materials and brilliant technique overwhelm the viewer and are intended to arouse wonder and admiration. Yet, the orchestration of the whole remains clear and decisive; the rich colours of varied materials are handled with extraordinary subtlety, and the ornamentation, to the most minute detail, is of the highest artistic order.

This video discusses the altar’s decoration, while this video shows how the altar “arouses wonder and admiration,” just like the 2018 Ramblers basketball team. “Go forth and set the world on fire,” Ramblers! Your friends at the Ryerson & Burnham Libraries are cheering you on.