Chiesa di Sant'Ignazio di Loyola

Sant'Ignazio di Loyola is a Jesuit church beside the Collegio Romano, renowned for Andrea Pozzo's painted architecture: a vault that opens into an imagined heaven and a canvas that supplies the dome the building lacks.

Why it matters

Dedicated to Ignatius of Loyola, the church stands beside the Jesuit college in Campo Marzio. Pozzo's perspective painting makes the saint's entry into paradise appear to break through the nave vault into the sky. At the crossing, a painted dome replaces a built one. The church also holds the tombs of Saints Aloysius Gonzaga, John Berchmans and Robert Bellarmine.

What to notice

A marble disc in the nave marks the viewpoint from which Pozzo's illusion aligns. At the crossing, the present false dome follows his design; the earlier painting was lost to fire and Francesco Manno repainted it in 1823. Camillo Rusconi's marble statue of Saint Ignatius, dated 1728, stands in the apse area, alongside the monument to Pope Gregory XV, who canonised the founder of the order. The presbytery frescoes include Ignatius's vision at La Storta. Outside, Filippo Raguzzini laid out the small trapezoidal square in front of the church in 1727–28; the facade deliberately echoes the nearby Gesù.

Context and history

The Jesuits established the church beside their Roman college to honour their founder. Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi funded the project. The design is credited to Jesuit mathematician Orazio Grassi, drawing on plans associated with Carlo Maderno. Pozzo decorated the vault between 1685 and 1694, and his treatise on perspective helped spread the method across Europe. The church remains in Jesuit hands and serves as a place of worship.