ORATORY OF THE NATIVITY
Oratorio della Natività di Gesù
Via Beccaria 9
6877 Coldrerio
The Oratory of the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, commonly known as the Church of the Nativity, was built to the design and at the will of Carlo Beccaria (1604-1695), architect and master builder working in the sphere of Bernini. Both Carlo and his brother Giacomo (1598-1671) were noted as working in Rome and Lazio, in the employ of Pope Alexander VII Chigi. For Carlo, the provision of a church for his home hamlet marked the crowning achievement of a long and fruitful career and satisfied a community need. The construction site opened in 1674 and the work was completed within a few months (Fig. 1).
Works were carried out in 1976-1977 to repair leaks that had damaged the frescoes. In 2008-2010 the façade and interior were restored.
Interior
The church takes the form of a single nave with two barrel-vaulted bays and a quadrangular choir (Fig. 2, 3). The chancel vault is decorated with faux stucco lacunars (Fig. 4, 5). The vault rises over pilasters with capitals enlivened by cherubs, stylistically close to elements in Borrominian architecture (Fig. 6). The altar, balustrade and frames of the two side doorways are made of Arzo marble (Fig. 7). The frescoed altarpiece and other wall paintings have been attributed to the painter Giovan Paolo Recchi (1606-1686) of Como. The paintings are surrounded by stucco frames embellished with flowers, festoons and cartouches (Fig. 8). Together, the frescos and stuccos tell stories of the birth, infancy, and life of Christ and the Virgin.
The architecture and decorative elements of the church demonstrate the influence of the Roman Baroque, and particularly Borromini, in Beccaria's cultural development. Examples are seen in the ornamental uses of terracotta on the façade, in the abstract capitals, the geometric decoration of the presbytery vault, the insertion of the cherubs in the volutes of the interior capitals: all of these are stylistically close to the same elements in the works of Borromini, however in those cases made with marble.
