BATTAGIO (BATTACCHIO), GIOVANNI. — Architect; in 1465–66 he was engaged in restoring the hospital of Lodi, his native city; in 1481 he was in the service of the duke of Milan; in 1484 he undertook with Agostino de' Fonduti the commission for the façade of the Landi palace at Piacenza; in 1488 he drew up the contract for the construction of the Incoronata at Lodi; in 1490 he took part in the competition for the tiburium of Milan Cathedral, awarded to Amadeo; in 1490 he designed S. Maria della Croce at Crema, on which he worked until 1493.
The Incoronata at Lodi, with its octagonal plan, derives from Bramante’s sacristy of S. Satiro in Milan: there B., in place of semicircular niches, employs trapezoidal niches with the cornice in perspective in order to increase the space illusionistically. Although B. ceased to wor-
(fot. Alinari)
BATTAGIO, GIOVANNI. – Exterior and bell tower of the church of the Incoronata – Lodi.
Although he ceased to supervise the works as early as 1489 and construction was completed only at the beginning of the sixteenth century, his design was not modified, as is shown by the organic unity of the whole, maintained both inside and outside, characteristically Lombard in form in the eight-segment dome covered by the tiburium.
S. Maria della Croce at Crema presents a central-plan structure variously articulated by four niches opening onto its perimeter, with projecting chapels covered by domes, arranged so as to form a Greek cross within which the central rotunda is inscribed. Inside, the use of columns projecting from the walls, rather than pillars, gives the building a sense of movement.
The exterior (in which the terminal loggia is by Giovanni Antonio Montanaro, who completed the church in 1500) appears as a cylindrical tower, surrounded by a covering entirely pierced with openwork, enlivened by the vivid chromaticism of the terracotta decoration.
With B., Bramantesque forms, in keeping with the tendencies of Lombardy, yield to a predominantly chromatic vision.
B. was also a modeller of terracottas; the busts within medallions in the interior of the Incoronata, and two others above the doors of S. Maria della Croce, may be attributed to him.