La cappella di San Giacomo

During the course of the fourteenth century, the Basilica of Sant’Antonio in Padua was in the process of becoming much more than a centre of congregation and a cornerstone of civic identity: it was developing into a Pantheon for the local aristocracy, a set of apartments, virtually, for the nobility of Carrarese Padua, at least to judge from the numerous family chapels that were built there. Of all these chapels, one in particular stands out: the monumental chapel erected by Bonifacio Lupi, which he secured thanks to finances gleaned from his activities as a mercenary and diplomat, as well as the earnings from his estate. Lupi’s chapel was one of the most prestigious spaces available within the new liturgical-devotional layout that had redefined the Franciscan building in the decades prior. The construction and sculptural decoration of the new chapel were entrusted, according to a rather detailed contract dated 12 February 1372, to the Venetian sculptor Andriolo de’ Sanctis. Meanwhile, Altichiero and Jacopo Avanzi were given the task of painting the chapel’s walls with a cycle representing Stories of Saint James the Greater, completed between 1376 and 1379. This essay analyses the monument in its entirety, considering the decoration of the chapel of San Giacomo an extraordinary example of joint programming, conceived from the beginning in a manner whereby the space and its furnishings would find their perfect counterpoint in the pictorial decoration. The iconographic program was designed by a refined concepteur, perhaps Lombardo della Seta, drawing into alignment the wishes of the commissioning family – with its aristocratic entourage – and the powerful Franciscan community. The representation of the Stories is therefore read on many levels, which this essay seeks to interrogate: as a reference to events surrounding the patron and his family group, as a promotion of their own image within a careful dynastic celebration, and as a political glorification of the reigning family and of the city of Padua. Finally, this essay evaluates the modalities of the pictorial representation, namely the system of partitions, the conception of the space and the perspectival novelties, viewed within the context of the development of Paduan figurative culture in the second half of the Trecento.