ARTOGNE

Church of Santa Maria ad Nives

Rebuilding of a sixteenth-century chapel which by bishop’s decree broke away from the parish church of Artogne, the current church was completed towards the end of the eighteenth century.It is located on an open space along the back of the mountain, in a position almost equidistant from Case Negri, Case Pedri and Case Cotti was dedicated to the Madonna della Neve who is celebrated on August 5th.
The churchyard is accessed via 23 steps that make the façade striking with contrasts of volumes, surfaces and colors. The side compartments of the rich granite portal, marked by closely spaced pilasters, project slightly from the central compartment. The elegant and slender bell tower is also made of granite.
The interior consists of a nave with two bays, 4 altars plus the main altar in polychrome marble, where the red of Verona, yellow and white prevail. The vault is barrel vaulted with stucco decorations and splendid frescoes signed and dated “Domenico Quaglio pinse, 1760”. Other frescoes are present on the lunette “the cenacle” and in the four corners of the presbytery “the four evangelists”
The seventeenth-century altarpiece of the main altar narrates the miracle of the Madonna della Neve with S. Carlo, while at the altar of the Rosary there is a wooden statue of the Madonna by a sixteenth-century artist.