Chiesa di Santa Maria Maddalena

Santa Maria Maddalena in Castiglione del Lago combines a nineteenth-century neoclassical building with paintings from earlier periods. The parish church preserves a range of devotional images within its later architectural setting.

Why it matters

The collection connects the rebuilt church with the longer religious history of the town. Medieval and Renaissance painting appears alongside work associated with the nineteenth-century renewal.

What to notice

A sixteenth-century panel of the enthroned Madonna is associated with a pupil of Perugino. A Madonna del Latte belongs to the Sienese tradition of the fourteenth century. Fresco decoration by Mariano Piervittori adds a later element. Their different dates reveal that the church's artistic contents do not all belong to the rebuilding campaign.

Context and history

The parish has medieval antecedents and a historical connection with the church of Saints James and Philip. The present building was rebuilt from 1836 in neoclassical forms. Piervittori's work of around 1850 contributed to its decoration. These changes preserved a religious role while giving inherited paintings a new architectural home.