Il fascino rassicurante della tradizione quattrocentesca: alcune note su Lorenzo Fasolo a Chiavari

The deep roots of Lorenzo Fasolo from Pavia in the figurative tradition of the fifteenth century, linked in particular to the lessons learnt from Foppa and Bergognone, preserved the painter from a hasty and superficial adherence to the stylistic features of Leonardo, which were widespread in Lombard art in the period straddling the two centuries. Lorenzo’s moderate formal solutions, attentive to didactic effectiveness and marked, perhaps, also by the example of wooden sculpture, were congenial to the religious orders and to the confraternities – especially in the Franciscan context. An exemplary case of this phenomenon can be found in his production in Chiavari. The essay focuses on the works to be found in the convent of San Bernardino, providing information also on the client who commissioned the Lamentation altarpiece, Vincenzo Rivarola. A fresco located in Lavagna further permits observation of the results of his mature work, akin to the contemporary research of artists like Gandolfino da Roreto and Ludovico Brea, aimed at reaching an alternative modernity with respect to the proposals of the more orthodox followers of the Da Vinci master.