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Bussola, Dionigi
(b Milan, 1615; d Milan, 15 Sept 1687). Italian sculptor. He and his son, Cesare Bussola (b Milan, 1653; d after 1735), were involved in the major sculptural projects of 17th-century Lombardy, and their elaborate and theatrical sculptural decorations brilliantly expressed the spirit and objectives of the Counter-Reformation. Dionigi was trained in Rome, where he was influenced by Ercole Ferrata and by the academic training promulgated by the Accademia di S Luca. He returned from Rome in 1645, and between 1645 and 1651 worked at Milan Cathedral, where he completed Gaspare Vismara’s statues of St Martin and St Andrew (1651). Later (1655–9) he executed part of the sculptural decoration of the vault of the chapel of the Madonna dell’Albero. In 1658 he became leader of the team of sculptors working in the cathedral and in the same year executed three low reliefs for the façade, showing scenes from the Life of Elijah, which formed a prelude to his intense activity for the sacrimonti of Piedmont and Lombardy (see SACROMONTE). These reliefs show the beginnings of a dynamic, passionate style, indebted to Gianlorenzo Bernini, yet still restrained by the vestiges of Mannerist formulae, while in the works for the sacrimonti he drew on his knowledge of Roman art, above all of the illusionist decorative frescoes of Pietro da Cortona and Giovanni Lanfranco, to attain a new theatrical power. The series of works for the sacrimonti opened with the large and elaborate Assumption of the Virgin (1661; Varallo, Basilica dell’Assunta), which unites painting and sculpture, incorporating 140 realistically coloured statues. There followed the terracotta group of the Crucifixion (1660–70) in Chapel X of the sacromonte at Varese, which is perfectly united with the frescoed decoration by Antonio Busca, and the group of terracotta statues (c. 1670) distributed between at least ten chapels of the sacromonte at Orta, which depict, with intense theatrical rhetoric, scenes from the Life of St Francis of Assisi. In the same period Bussola continued to work for Milan Cathedral, creating statues of various subjects in 1661, 1662 and 1663; he collaborated with his son Cesare, and the attribution of some of the more refined works, such as St Dorothy (1667) and Habakuk, remains uncertain.
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