Cigoli's Immacolata and Galileo's Moon: Astronomy and the Virgin in Early Seicento Rome

The moon in Lodovico Cigoli's Immacolata fresco (1610-12) in the Pauline Chapel, S. Maria Maggiore, Rome, departs radically from tradition, appearing not as a perfect crescent but as a crater-pocked sphere, just as Cigoli's friend Galileo had observed it through his telescope and had publi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Art bulletin (New York, N.Y.) N.Y.), 1996-06, Vol.78 (2), p.218-235
Main Author: Ostrow, Steven F.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Art criticism
Art history
Christian symbolism
Christianity
Cigoli, Lodovico (1559-1613)
Earths Moon
Fresco
Moon
Natural satellites
Popes
Renaissance art
Selenology
Society of Jesus
Symbolism
Theology
Visual arts
Citations: Items that this one cites
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Summary:The moon in Lodovico Cigoli's Immacolata fresco (1610-12) in the Pauline Chapel, S. Maria Maggiore, Rome, departs radically from tradition, appearing not as a perfect crescent but as a crater-pocked sphere, just as Cigoli's friend Galileo had observed it through his telescope and had published it in 1610. This study focuses on the reception of Cigoli's and Galileo's moon in light of Christian lunar symbolism and astronomical theory. At issue are the theological implications of a maculate moon within an image of the Immaculate Virgin in a papal chapel and how the Church accommodated the new cosmology to theological traditions.
ISSN:0004-3079
1559-6478
DOI:10.1080/00043079.1996.10786681