A PAINTING BY CARLO AMALFI AT SAN PAOLO CHURCH IN SORRENTO

The Church of San Paolo, part of the now disused Benedictine monastery of the same name, can at last be visited in normal opening hours after years of being open only occasionally. On the right wall of the presbytery is a canvas with a Marian theme dated 1736 AD: it depicts the Assumption and the coronation of the Virgin Mary before the Holy Trinity. The composition follows an upward curve with the figures ascending gradually. The figures are outlined and in chiaroscuro; deep shadows modelling the robes around their bodies. Chromatically, the predominant colours are in cool tones with warmer tones added (the pink in Mary’s robes, Christ’s ochre loincloth). The main figures in the painting are surrounded by the misty light of a dull day, the clouds threatening rain. I personally have no doubt whatsoever that the painting is by the Sorrento artist Carlo Amalfi (1707-1787), even though it is not officially recorded as one of his works in the list edited by Immacolata Aiello for her degree dissertation (Speaker Prof. G. Previtali, 1987). In fact, there is no signature on the painting, so we cannot be certain of the artist. If, however, we examine the two pictures by Carlo Amalfi kept in the Church of the Addolorata (Lady of Sorrows) in Sorrento, the Seven Seraphs before the Holy Trinity dated 1739, and the Holy Family dated 1741, in which the influence of Francesco Solimena is evident, then we have to say that the painting in the Church of San Paolo represents a starting point for the Sorrento artist, perfectly capable of expressinghimself in the Baroque manner even as other styles were becoming popular, as seen in works much later in his career, such as the paintings in the Church of the Servi di Maria, their essentialityand clarity announcing a change of direction, taste and style.