GAGINI, Pace

Italian sculptor, part of a family of sculptors, masons and architects. One branch of the family, which came from Bissone, Ticino, was active in Genoa from the 15th century. The Gagini workshop was organized along medieval lines: they produced works in collaboration, combining the skills of mason and sculptor. Their work was chiefly of a decorative and ornamental nature, figurative sculpture being of secondary importance. They remained active in Genoa until the 19th century.

Pace was trained in the masons’ lodge at the Certosa di Pavia. Initially he worked for his uncle Antonio della Porta as a “piccatore lapidum”. On 6 November 1493 he signed a four-year contract with his uncle Antonio to work as a “scultor et magister figurarum marmoris”. Pace’s collaboration and partnership with his uncle lasted until 1513. In 1501 Francesco Lomellini commissioned them to construct a family chapel in S Teodoro, Genoa. After the church’s destruction in 1870, the altar retable, depicting the Adoration of the Christ Child, and the monument to Lomellini were incorporated into the present church. In 1504 Pace undertook to supply two marble columns for the main doorway of the monastery church of the Certosa di Pavia. Before 1513 Pace and della Porta worked on the right-hand tabernacle in the choir of the Certosa.

Pace Gagini collaboration with Antonio della Porta included several French and Spanish commissions.