RAGGI, Antonio

One of the last major projects by Bernini was the angels for the Ponte Sant’Angelo in Rome. Planned and executed between 1667 and 1669, the suite of eight, and subsequently ten, angels was designed by Bernini for Pope Clement IX as an embellishment to the ancient Roman Pons Aelius, which formed the principal link between the Vatican and the city. The major sculptors of the day were chosen to carve individual statues of the angels, each holding an instrument of the Passion of Christ, with two reserved for Bernini himself. The degree to which Bernini’s collaborators followed his intentions varied markedly, a reflection of the distance between the aging sculptor and his successors. Part of the disparity can be explained by his working method: Bernini left it to studio draughtsmen to make copies of his initial sketches.

One of the last major projects by Bernini was the angels for the Ponte Sant’Angelo in Rome. Planned and executed between 1667 and 1669, the suite of eight, and subsequently ten, angels was designed by Bernini for Pope Clement IX as an embellishment to the ancient Roman Pons Aelius, which formed the principal link between the Vatican and the city. The major sculptors of the day were chosen to carve individual statues of the angels, each holding an instrument of the Passion of Christ, with two reserved for Bernini himself. The degree to which Bernini’s collaborators followed his intentions varied markedly, a reflection of the distance between the aging sculptor and his successors. Part of the disparity can be explained by his working method: Bernini left it to studio draughtsmen to make copies of his initial sketches.

In the upper part of the ceiling the separation between Baciccio’s painting, statues and decoration is very neat. The most striking aspect is the fact that the angels appear to be floating in the air. They were designed by two of the most talented younger scholars of Bernini (Antonio Raggi and Leonardo Retti).

The decoration of the Chigi Chapel was designed by Bernini. The most important parts of the decoration, along with the mosaics and the reliefs, were the four sculptures placed into the niches between the columns holding the cupola. Two of them, Jerome and Mary Magdalen, were made by Bernini. The other two statues were by artists from Bernini’s workshop, St Catherine of Siena by Ercole Ferrata and St Bernardino of Siena by Antonio Raggi.

The chapel as a whole was designed by Bernini.

In the fa�ade of the church San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Francesco Borromini included a visionary element, characteristic of his late style. Above the entrance there are herms ending in very large, lively cherubs’ heads, whose wings form a protecting arch for the figure of St Charles Borromeo in the niche, sculpted by Antonio Raggi.

Antonio Raggi worked alongside Bernini on the stuccoes at Castelgandolfo and the Roman churches of Sant’Andrea al Quirinale and the Gesù, shaping with his modelling tool graceful women and lovable putti, martyrs and garlands, youths and maidens.

The relief was based upon a model by Algardi’s close collaborator Giuseppe Peroni (1624-1686), whose idea appears to have been followed for the basic disposition of Pope Urban I and his retinue on the left-hand side of the relief. Raggi could not resist adding his own mannerisms, especially with the more emotive figures on the right, whose attenuated proportions and extravagant drapery recall Bernini’s late style. However, narrative clarity has been sacrificed to Raggi’s penchant for surface detail, a pitfall instinctively avoided by Algardi, but common even in the best late Baroque reliefs.