Monumental colonnade

From neoclassical sublime
death to post-modern purity of form.

For a history of tomb typology walking among class I sepulchres.

All Italian cemeteries always have a ‘nobler’ area where the graves are older and artistically richer. In country cemeteries there are gravestones and small sets of monuments, usually set against the boundary walls. In big cities and small provincial towns, this area is often found under porticoes, where the tombs are more important and often created by artists.
Sant’Anna does not escape this factual reality and the arcades, which border the northern part of the original Catholic burial ground, house the class I graves.
Walking among them, we will attempt to sketch out a brief history of the different types of tombs, from the neoclassical ones, which depict death in a sublime manner, to those of the second half of the 20th century, characterised by a certain formal purity.
Canova-style tombs all have the same characteristics: the 'stelae' tombs with urns and funerary genii and the 'sarcophagus' tombs with sphinxes, busts, columns and female figures. The sepulchres of Cassis Faraone of 1841, Ivanovich Tripcovich of 1844 and Corti Gregorutti of 1850 fall into this category, the last two by Angelo Cameroni (Venice 1817-1867).
Towards the middle of the 19th century, tombs began to be designed by drawing eclectically on different historical styles or reinterpreting neoclassical solutions. This group includes the Slocovich Passarevich tombs of 1864 by Giovanni Duprè (Siena 1817-Florence 1882), Tonello of 1872 by Guglielmo Schiff (Mannheim 1837-Gorizia 1891) and Girardelli Biasi of 1874 by Giovanni Battista Benzoni (Rome 1853 - active until 1889).
The key name in this period was Donato Barcaglia (Pavia 1849-Rome 1930), the creator of the most monumental and theatrical tombs, rich in references to the 16th century and with female presences, anticipating Art Nouveau taste: Brucker Holzknecht of 1877, Girardelli of 1883 and Scrinzi Marenzi of 1888. Later examples of eclecticism are the neo-baroque Cappelletti Türk tomb by Rudolf von Weyr (Vienna 1847-1914) of 1895 and the neo-Renaissance de Reinelt sepulchre by Pietro Canonica (Moncalieri 1869-Roma 1959) of 1905.
The gallery of sculptors from Trieste opens with Romeo Rathmann (Trieste 1880-London 1961) who, again in 1905, created the Ruzzier tomb with a design that was still 19th century. Tied instead to Leonardo Bistolfi's ideas are Giovanni Mayer (Trieste 1863-1943) and Giovanni Marin (Trieste 1875-travelling 1926). The latter was responsible for the Cambiagio tomb of 1927 which was however designed before the Great War. More or less similar are the vicissitudes of the Arrigo Modugno tomb: designed in 1906 but built almost twenty years later. The Bistolfi references are very clear: a certain floral graphic style and a refined symbolism.
During the early post-war period with the 'return to order', there is a modern revival of classical sculpture and a simplification of burial space. The Fortuna tomb by Alfonso Canciani (Brazzano 1863-Trieste 1955) from 1943 should be interpreted as moving in this direction.
After World War II, the sculptural idiom turned towards schematisation and an almost Baroque dynamism. This style is found in the Zamparo Bignami tomb by Ugo Carà (Muggia 1908-Trieste 2004) from 1964 and in the Godina tomb by Tristano Alberti (Trieste 1915-1976) from 1967.
The sobriety of the Sain tomb by Carlo Borghi (Trieste 1940- ) from 1981 almost seems to return to the neoclassical spirit encountered at the beginning of the route. The presence of the portrait in profile, distantly reminiscent of ancient medals, and the purity of the polished solid parts suggest the stylistic features of post modernism. The postmodern understatement of the Sain tomb from 1981 marks the end of this period.