TERRITORY

Up through the ancient gate a steep, narrow, dark street, and everywhere you look, wherever you pass, everything is ancient, medieval, stony cold and hard. Tiny alleys carved out between tall rough stone houses, ancient towers, portals, castles, churches and walls. At the top I was greeted by a cold, sharp wind. Bundled in my cloak, I had a beautiful and touching vision: beyond an ancient wall, the Umbrian landscape, green and bright, enclosed within a mighty circle of high, still snow-capped mountains. Near or far, there is no sight that does not touch an ancient, famous, sacred place; there it is Spoleto, Perugia, Assisi, Foligno, Spello, Terni and in between hundreds of smaller places, villages, churches, courtyards, monasteries, fortresses and farmhouses: a land rich in history, Roman and pre-Roman monuments, crossed by the small river Clitumno, which we often read about when we studied Latin... Dumbfounded with wonder, I crossed the square, exited the city through one of the gates, re-entered through the next, walked along corners and steep streets. Outside the city I found a magnificent garden surrounding a solitary villa, now uninhabited and somewhat dilapidated; there I rested under old cypress trees, watching the alternation of broad patches of shade and thin streaks of sunshine in the green valley. I saw Assisi and, nearby, the Porziuncola, transfigured by the grace and enchantment that St Francis and ancient Umbrian art have infused into this land. And then I set out to follow the traces of this Franciscan art beyond Assisi, no place offering better opportunities than Montefalco. Inside churches and chapels, above portals and altars, I discovered ancient frescoes populated with delicate figures pervaded by joyful devotion: beautiful merciful madonnas, graceful young saints. Sacred images taken from biblical history and hagiography, some mournful and severe, others aflame with devotion, others still laughing with childlike joy.

Tenacious, they remain to mark, in the continuity of gestures and traditions, the suture between eras. Still opulent at every harvest, they tell of an ancient presence of domestic vines surrounded by the high walls of vegetable gardens, testifying to the uninterrupted and constant love, the enduring predilection of Montefalco for this vine that is its symbol, its wealth, its pride. To follow its traces through the tangle of houses tightly clinging to the buttresses shrouded in haloes of shadow, is to enter an ideal territory and find there, in the rare symbiosis between vine and stone, the suggestion of human presence, as if restored to the everyday of Time. In the luminous wide of the 'Castellina' strong shrubs, living creatures, preserved by the careful will of man. On the walls along via de’ Vasari, as in a thirteenth-century sinopia, is written the continuous change of man's project, his sense of self, his aspirations. The houses are lined up almost in silent procession, alternating with shy vegetable gardens with walls of stone and limestone from which shadows of green escape, with "closed" from which the overbearing vegetation overflows onto the warm pink brickwork. Behind the small antique-painted porticos, scourged by the sun and the frost of mute seasons, one can guess the generous vineyards of yesteryear, the memory of which remains in short rows of vines. In this village, the union between the life of the fields and that of the craftsman was a happy one. The intimate nature of Montefalco is made up of humility, rigour, strength, tenacious ties with the land, which have always been its vocation. In front of an ancient well, from which the area has long quenched its thirst, clinging to the façade of nearby houses, more Sagrantino vines. Next to the oldest ones, spreading their centuries-old arms on the walls, young vines that have recently been renewed, carefully supported by painless supports: they suggest the reassuring idea of a youth ready to take the place of old age to guarantee the continuity of existence, that of a parallel path between man and land, capable of safeguarding their empathetic relationship, thanks to which man is able to live with the surrounding environment and to keep it intact for posterity, just like a work of art.

It will not be by chance that your madeleine is a goblet of wine, because recherche here is not poignant introspection, but rather a sunny reading of the relationship between man and the earth. The “here” is Montefalco. They call it the railing of Umbria. Feel the peculiarity of the word: railing. It evokes domestic and popular atmospheres, carries a lively rhythm, and bears an inclusive meaning. Montefalco attracts: it grants the gaze alone the freedom to run over the hilly horizon.The bliss of the eyes is the theme of a score that harmonises eternal art with secular becoming, counterpointed by the pleasures of the glass and the table. These are the eyes that Benozzo di Lese di Sandro fills with light, with severity, with spirit. Those of St. Francis fixed upon those of St. Dominic, those of Christ who makes himself a pilgrim, those of the simple man who implores the Spirit. Our own eyes are captured by the fresco in the Church of St. Francis-a unique pictorial event. This is the reason for our journey through the Umbrian Renaissance “written” by Benozzo, to whom Vasari gave the surname Gozzoli. Montefalco—one of the places of choice, along with Orvieto and San Gimignano, for this great Florentine painter and pupil of Beato Angelico—dedicates to him an exhibition that is a memorable event. Rarely has such a dense review of painting between the 14th and 16th centuries been offered in the very places where it was produced. So much so that the frescoes of the life of St. Francis, narrated in the homonymous church that also houses Montefalco’s picture gallery, become a paradigm of the surrounding landscape. Starting with that cruet of wine Benozzo paints on the Franciscan table, he tells us about Sagrantino: the wine symbol of Montefalco, said to have been produced by Franciscan monks for mass. Ancient vines, declared vegetable monuments, still survive within the urban fabric. You will encounter them as you wander through the ancient streets, skirt the old Spedale, reach the square, and climb to the top of the town hall tower, from which Umbria is revealed, like a true masterpiece— a fresco painted by the Good Lord himself. Let us therefore read it, as we do with Benozzo’s work. To the north one glimpses Perugia, and just below, Foligno—long in conflict with the “capital” over the legation of Montefalco. Foligno is worth a visit, as it preserves intact not only its urban structure but also the customs of its medieval fabric. Beyond lies Assisi. Though geographically remote, the Franciscan cradle is present here through the enduring culture of the Poverello, which Gozzoli imbues with aristocratic asceticism. Equally aristocratic, looking eastwards, is Spello: coiled on its hill, with a stony elegance. There you will find another great Pinturicchio, in the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore. Nor should you forget the climb to Mount Subasio, a suggestive ascent through woods and olive groves. Closer to Montefalco lies Bevagna, shaped by the Clitunno. Its entrance through the ancient wash-houses is poignant; within, a jewel-like theatre and splendid Roman mosaics speak of ancient nobility. Then Trevi: here the civilisation of oil is supremely expressed, here Pinturicchio and Giovanni di Corraduccio left admirable traces of their art, here Sant’Emilia offers the incomparable view of the Clitunno Valley, which romantically awaits to enchant you with its springs and its small Roman temple celebrating the god of water. It is a place you will imagine populated by Nymphs and Elves. Yet that pagan imagery does not clash with Franciscan sacredness: the harmony of these places builds an Arcadia of beauty and nature. Looking towards Spoleto —worthy of a visit in its own right—stands Castel Ritaldi, where the sacred art of Tiberius of Assisi is condensed in the beautiful parish church of San Nicola. And further still, Giano dell’Umbria, offering the Church of San Michele, another treasure trove of art. Beyond is Gualdo Cattaneo, with its admirable cylindrical tower, and in Sant’Agostino, a remarkable fresco from the Alunno workshop, one of the protagonists of the 15th-century Umbrian School. This art narrates, through images, the ancient rural civilisation still visible today in Umbria’s vineyards, olive groves, and flavors. Among all these panoramas, the genius loci finds its purest expression in the cycle of San Francesco in Montefalco. Benozzo, almost as though rewriting the verses of the Canticle with figures, depicted not only the spiritual vicissitudes and the biography of the Saint, but also his lands. Even today Brother Sun makes them splendid with life, and Sister Moon casts over them her spirit. It is the gospel of Brother Francis—the gospel of nature. And if not here, where?

Commissioning
The work was commissioned by Fra Jacopo da Montefalco, guardian of the Convent of St. Francis, who is mentioned in the dedicatory inscription and portrayed in the episode of the Blessing of the People of Montefalco. However, it was Friar Antonio da Montefalco, of the "rival" Order of the Observants, who first called Benozzo to the Umbrian city. Antonio got to know the artist when he was working as Beato Angelico's assistant on the decorations in the Vatican. Appreciating his talents, he secured his presence in Montefalco in 1450, commissioning the artist to create both panel and fresco works for his church of San Fortunato. These works must have impressed Fra Jacopo, given that Benozzo was asked to contribute to the convent church of San Francesco only two years later. Benozzo moved seamlessly from one church to another. The results that the painter achieved were profoundly different, as the message that the two patrons suggested to him was different.

Sources
Called upon to illustrate the life of St. Francis, Benozzo used the great Giottesque model, but departed from it, as, at the probable suggestion of Friar Jacopo himself, he referred to two well-known Franciscan texts: the Legenda Maior by Bonaventura da Bagnoregio, which became the official biography of the saint from 1266, and the Legend of the Three Companions, which, focusing above all on the events in Assisi of Francis, was an important source of inspiration for the depiction of the related scenes.

The cycle
The life of the saint, from birth to death, is illustrated in twelve scenes arranged in three registers. The narration proceeds, like an ideal elevation, from bottom to top and culminates in the vault with the glory of Saint Francis. The leitmotif of the cycle is the identification of Francis as the "new Christ" (alter Christus), a central concept of Franciscan spirituality. The second register shows in a panel the scene of a dinner, whose protagonists are St. Francis and the Knight of Celano, by whom the saint had been invited. Two bottles are depicted on the table, one of water and one of red wine, and since there are frequent references to events and local characters of that time, as in the scene of the Blessing of Montefalco and its people, the detail of the red wine could also be interpreted as a precise reference to the production of Sagrantino di Montefalco, a wine whose name comes precisely from its use in the administration of the sacraments.

Style
Benozzo found himself directing a painting site for the first time after having been employed by Angelico for many years in Florence, Rome and Orvieto. In the adoption of particular compositional modules, in the predilection for certain human types and in the balance of color, the memory of the years in which he was closest to Angelico guides Benozzo in this undertaking. However, as had been the case in his early Montefalco works in San Fortunato, the barely thirty-year-old Benozzo reveals truly original qualities in the Franciscan cycle: a more detailed and narrative-driven style, a use of color that is both expressive and decorative.

Criticism
Benozzo’s artistic activity in Umbria, entirely overlooked by Vasari, gained particular appreciation in the 19th century, when his work was often interpreted through a mystical lens. His Franciscan Stories in Montefalco played a significant role in the transformation of Umbrian Proto-Renaissance visual culture.