Biographical Dictionary of Italians - Volume 3 (1961)
by Maria Luisa Trebiliani
ANDREOLI, Giuseppe.
- He was born in San Possidonio (Modena) around 1791 from humble parents. Initiated to literary studies by the parish priest of his native country, as a young man he wore the clerical habit with the intention of embracing the priesthood, but the lack of financial means to complete his studies and the paternal hostility forced him to follow a other way.
Helped by his uncle Giovan Battista A., archpriest of S. Martino in Rio, and obtained a subsidy from the marquises Taccoli, feudal lords of San Possidonio, he was able to enroll in the University of Bologna in 1811 and carry out his studies as a surveyor. But the A. he did not like this profession and, following the unsettled aspirations of an adolescent, he entered the priestly life and devoted himself to literary studies. In 1819 he became tutor in the house of the Soliani Raschini counts in Reggio Emilia, with the support of whom, it is not known whether in '20 or in '21, he obtained the chair of rhetoric in the college of oblates in Correggio. In the spring of 1820, according to the documents of the trial, it seems that his affiliation with the Carboneria, which he had been initiated in the Fattori house in Reggio Emilia, can be traced back.
In the climate of discontent and agitation, which spread in the Modenese duchy with the Restoration, according to the contemporaries, the consent of the A. to the Carbonare ideas, but through what evolution of thought in him a priest has matured, the adhesion to this secret society and what was his reaction to the bull Ecclesiam a Iesu Christo with which Pius VII in 1821 condemned the Carbonari, not it is possible to ascertain
exactly, given the scarcity of documents and, above all, of his writings.
From the procedural documents it appears that the to. he had been an active diffuser of liberal ideas and had been able to win over numerous young people to the cause. He would not have interrupted his clandestine action even when, in 1821, the arrests had begun for the discovery in Modena of a proclamation in Latin, with which the Hungarian soldiers of the Austrian army directed to Naples were incited not to fight against a brotherly people who he defended his freedom. At the beginning of 1822, on the occasion of other arrests carried out by the police, it seems that his name was revealed to the investigating authority during the interrogations. On the night of 26 February he was arrested in Correggio and taken first to Reggio, then to Modena, in the prisons of the town hall.
In reality, his political activity, as it results from the proceedings, appears rather vague and uncertain; there is no other documentation and his own biographers overlook the years preceding his arrest.
On the period spent in prison and on the events of the sentence and execution, fellow prisoners and contemporaries have written patrioticly passionate pages, but, at times, contradict each other in facts and evaluations. THERE. he would have bravely endured suffering and humiliation, resisting the flattery and threats of the governor L. Coccapani and the police chief G. Besini. But he would later confess to a cellmate - perhaps a spy - that he was a Carbonaro and, on the basis of his informing, the trial, which took place in Rubiera, where the extraordinary state court, established in May 1822 with a ducal decree with which any privilege of forum was abolished; consequently the Modenese priest was tried only by the civil court without taking into account the ecclesiastical one.
The 11th Sept. 1822 was issued the sentence of beheading for him and for nine other Carbonari, guilty of lesa
majesty and belonging to secret sects. Francesco IV, with an autograph letter of the following 11 October, commuted the death penalty to some inmates, reconfirming it for the to. and for some other accused, who, however, either because they were in default or because they were pardoned, all escaped the torture. The only one for which the duke did not let himself be moved, rejecting every request for pardon (including that of Msgr. A. Ficarelli, bishop of Reggio), was to. and his was the only execution. The punishment imposed on him appears absolutely disproportionate to his responsibilities: he seems to have been rather a victim of circumstances; above all his condition as a priest and educator provided the sovereign with the possibility of giving his subjects a tragic example and a severe warning. On October 16 he was reduced to the lay state, even before his authorization from Rome was received; executor of the sad ceremony was Msgr. GM Cattani, bishop of Carpi, having refused, according to some historians, that of Reggio. On the 17th, towards noon, the A. he went up to the gallows serenely.
Sources and Bibl .: A. Panizzi, On the trials and sentences against the accused of treason and adherence to the seven proscribed in the States of Modena, Madrid 1823 (reprinted with the title The first victims of Francesco IV Duke of Modena, edited by G. Carducci, Rome 1897); N. Bianchi, The Este duchies from 1815 to 1850, Turin 1852, I, pp. 24-26; A. Vannucci, The martyrs of Italian freedom from 1794 to 1848, 6th edition, II, Milan 1878, pp. 174-183; G. Silingardi, Ciro Menotti and the rev. of the year 1831, Florence 1881, pp. 40-50; C. Tassoni, Around the state trial of Rubiera against the Carbonari of the Este states (1822), Rome 1907; T. Fontana, The capture of DGA, in Rassegna stor. del Risorgimento, IV (1917), pp. 707-714; Id .. Imprisonment and death of Don A., ibid., V (1918), pp. 686-716; A. Villani, Fr GA
first victim of Francesco IV Duke of Modena, Reggio Emilia 1924; G. Leti, Carboneria and Freemasonry in the Italian Risorgimento, Genoa 1925, pp. 148-150. On the A. there are also some pamphlets of an exalting nature, of little historical interest. See also Diz. of the Risorgimento Naz., Encicl. Ital., Enc. Cattolica, to vocem.
Biographical Dictionary of Italians - Volume 3 (1961)
by Rezio Buscaroli
ANDREOLI, Giuseppe. - He was born in San Possidonio (Modena), to Domenico and Eleonora Senesi, on 11 January 1720. He studied painting in Bologna, under the guidance of Giuseppe Peraccini known as il Mirandolese, who had been a pupil of MA Franceschini. For the cathedral of Mirandola he painted a S. Possidonio, which, however, was removed and therefore lost in the restoration of 1858; of the same saint he drew and carved an image in wood in 1760. He performed an Assumption of the Virgin Mary in the presence of the twelve Apostles, which was donated by him to the church of S. Francesco, and an Annunciation for the sacristy of the oratory of SS. Sacrament. In the choir of this same oratory he painted two monochromatic rounds with the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem and Jesus delivering the keys to Peter; while, for the Tramuschio church, also in Mirandola, a small picture representing St. Luigi Gonzaga. 3 apr. 1776, and was buried in the oratory of S. Rocco. As for his "manner", he was somewhat affected by the elegant ease and fluency of Franceschi.
Bibl .: D. Felice Cerretti, Biographies of Mirandola, Mirandola 1901, p. 16 (vol. XIII of the series "Mirandolese historical memories"); U. Thieme-F. Becker, Allgem. Lexikon der bildenden Künstler, I, p. 478.
St. Augustine bishop and Doctor of the Church
This work was created by the Modenese painter Giuseppe Andreoli (1720-1776). The oil painting on canvas painting cm. 101 x 240 high. The work dates back to the period between 1745 and 1760. The author has depicted Augustine standing there, holding the pastoral staff in his left hand. With his right hand he holds a flap of the cope to his chest. The background used is dark. The original position of the work was in a niche of the church of the Gesù. Here, in fact, along the nave, there were niches, which were closed by ten paintings depicting saints and doctors of the church. Of the original endowment, only six remain, which were removed from their environment in 1760 when they were replaced with today's stucco statues by Petronius Tadolini. The canvas has been attributed to Andreoli thanks to the stylistic comparison with one of his other works executed in 1766 which depicts San Possidonio
At the base of the figure we read the writing AVGVSTINVS.
born in San Possidonio in 1871. His work is distinguished by an evident eclecticism that makes it
ranging from architecture to painting and photography, to the intersection between naturalism
and abstraction Ferrari became an architect by paternal imposition: weaned in Modena by a wet
nurse after coming down from the Apennines, she studied architecture at the University of
Genoa and completed her own training in 1892. He then moved to Turin to study painting at
the Accademia Albertina e Ancient and modern styles at the Royal Industrial Museum. In Turin he had as a teacher of painting Giacomo Grosso, author of the scandalous “Sacro Convegno” exhibited at the
Venice Biennale of 1895 (the last meeting of Don Giovanni's lovers around the corpse of their seducer), from which he perhaps took the taste of a calm irony, highlighting how religious iconography, used for his works in churches, implies a subtle sensual impulse. However, this relationship between art and religion will be much more explicit in the works of his son León, as we will see. Augusto Ferrari in Turin also devoted himself to photography and specialized under the guidance of Giacomo Grosso in the creation of "panoramas". Panorama was a nineteenth-century pictorial genre, a precursor of hyperrealism, installations and virtual reality. These were large transportable murals that occupied the walls of a circular room and that displaced the viewer, placed in the center of the room, creating the illusion of being in another scenario, for example in an exotic landscape or a famous battle. Ferrari collaborated with Grosso on the panorama of La Battaglia di Torino and, in 1910, on that of La Battaglia di Maipú, commissioned by the Argentine government for the centenary of the May Revolution, and 124 meters long by 15 meters high. In the same period, the Cine-Films company commissioned Ferrari to create the panorama of Messina destroyed by the 1908 earthquake, which was inaugurated on 7 July 1910 in Turin in the circular Pavilion of Valentino. In 1914 Ferrari landed in Buenos Aires to manage, on behalf of owners, the exhibition of the panorama of Messina, later canceled due to the economic crisis. The Possidiese painter settled in the convent of the Capuchin Fathers in Nueva Pompeya, a district of the capital. For his guests he decorated the walls of the refectory and painted portraits of priests. During the work in the Chapel of the Divine Rostro he met Susana Celia del Pardo whom he married in 1917. Two years earlier he had been in charge of the panorama of The Battle of Tucumán and that of the Battle of Salta, both 95 meters long and 11 meters high. fell in love with Argentina by traveling to battle zones to research and take photographs.Between 1917 and 1922 he restored and decorated the church of San Miguel in Buenos Aires, which was burned down during the 1955 revolution, the year he was injured in a demonstration losing an eye. For this church, in addition to modifying the external architecture, he painted 120 pictures. Interesting are the photographs of the models used by Ferrari for the sketches of paintings such as Le Nozze di Cana.
The Last Supper mentioning the Roman Renaissance: he, his wife, other family members or people found in the street are disguised as biblical characters, with turbans, cardboard crowns, false beards, cloth tunics, improbable headdresses. From this staging of prophets, saints, messiahs and naked martyrs a great entertainment and perhaps a desecrating intent. The same thing can be said for the photos of female nudes used as models for his easel painting. They were made during his stay in Italy with his family from 1922 to 1926, on the Tuscan coast or in the garden of his Turin home, pulling a curtain so that the neighbors would not see. In Italy Ferrari devoted himself to the study of the figure, the nude, the landscape and the views of Venice, staying in Viareggio, Turin and in the city of the Doges. Back in Argentina, he built in 1927 the cloister of the church of Nueva Pompeya, in a style eclectic that combines Romanesque, Arab and Norman influences in Sicily and the Neapolitan convent style. The following year he was in charge of a new panorama for the centenary of the founding of Bahía Blanca. His most important architectural work remains the great cathedral of Córdoba commissioned by the Capuchin Fathers, in neo-Gothic style, decorated with spiers and rose windows, a manifesto of an eclecticism that mentions the history of Italian art.In the decade 1930-40 he built just outside Córdoba the church of Villa Allende and a dozen houses including "La Cigarra" and "El Castillo", the latter also called "San Possidonio" in memory of the place where he was born. In the province of Córdoba he also built the church of Unquillo and, in collaboration with his son León, that of Rio Cuarto. There are also numerous unsuccessful architectural projects, of which the preparatory drawings remain.
With a beard and a secret glass eye, Augusto Ferrari lived a whole century (he died in 1970 at the age of 99), connecting the nineteenth century, of which he was a son, with his work, and the virtual world of contemporaneity. He skipped the twentieth century and the avant-garde, like a true heretical academic.
Gold Medal for Military Valor
Born in San Possidonio (Modena) on October 24, 1919, died in Modena on February 2, 2007, employee, Gold Medal for Military Valor. their activities during the liberation struggle. Immediately after the armistice, Borellini undertook first helping the disbanded soldiers, then as a relay and partisan fighter in the Modena area. Captured with her husband, Antichiaro Martini , she was terribly tortured. Three times brought in front of the firing squad, she never showed the slightest yield.
When the fascists released her, she gave up on securing herself to stay close to her prisoner husband; when he was shot, Borellini resumed his post as a fighter. Wounded during an action in April 1945, she refused to be rescued, in order not to hinder the task of her comrades in the fight. Alone she managed to stop a severe bleeding and repair to the Carpi hospital, where the doctors were forced to amputate her leg. While she was still hospitalized, she was identified by the fascist police, who subjected her to grueling, useless interrogations. Gina Borellini would have been shot if the insurrection had not occurred. After the Liberation, she was provincial councilor of Modena, president of the Union of Italian Women and of the Mutilated Association. She was also elected deputy in the I, II and III legislatures and was a member of the Defense Commission of the Chamber. This is the reason for the reward for value granted to Borellini: "A young bride, from the earliest days she devoted herself entirely to the cause of the liberation of Italy, sheltering disbanded and wanted soldiers and helping them in evading service with the Germans, a relay. Tireless and very audacious, she carried weapons, spread propaganda brochures, communicated orders, always regardless of the grave danger to which she was exposed. Arrested with her husband, she resisted the most atrocious tortures without saying a word about her comrades in combat. Three times she was brought before the firing squad together. she kept silent about her consort. Unexpectedly released, she refused to hide in the mountains in order to be closer to her husband who is still detained. Shot this one, arrested a brother, reached a partisan formation with which she faced unspeakable risks and inconveniences and did not hesitate to challenge the weapons giving frequent and luminous proofs of manly courage by the Black Brigades, seriously wounded in the leg in the desperate heroic resistance, she did not allow her companions to help her, only she was able to stop the copious hemorrhage and, drawing courage from the thought of her children, she evaded enemy searches. In the hospital of Carpi, identified by the fascist police, she undergoes, although already in very serious conditions, exhausting interrogations, but she is unshakable in her heroic decision. Amputated her leg, the insurrection rescues her from the vengeance of the fleeing enemy. Shining example of sacrifice and heroism ".