The Santa Chiara Cloister in Naples: the Survival of a Baroque Masterpiece

Queen Sancha of Majorca has certainly left her mark on Naples: among other structures, she mandated the building of the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata and also the double-monastic complex of the Basilica di Santa Chiara.

Her husband, King Roberto d’Anjou, is buried behind the main altar and the mid-14th-century funerary monument was sculpted by two brothers, Florentine sculptors, Giovanni and Pacio Bertini.

Tuscan architect Ferdinando Fuga’s marble pavement spreading out in the nave and leading to the presbytery (altar area), dates from the Baroque renovation of the basilica in the 18th-century undertaken by Domenico Antonio Vaccaro who completely canceled the Provencal-Gothic style of the original 14th-century edifice.

The pavement miraculously survived the Allied bombing of August 10, 1943 which devastasted the Basilica:

In the photos below, you can see the funerary monument both before the fire devastation due to the bomb..and after restoration in the 1950’s:

Fortunatamente, the World War II damage spared the cloister of the Clarisse (Poor Clares) transformed in the mid-18th-century by Domenico Antonio Vaccaro with the unique addition of Rococo’ maiolica tiles painted by ceramicists, Donato and Giuseppe Massa, their work concluding in 1740.

This sanctuary of extraordinary beauty embodies a contrast between the outer world of Neapolitan noise and confusion and the serenity and tranquility of the cloister garden.

The bright, bold colors with exuberant floral decorations seem in contrast to the silent, introspective world of the cloistered Poor Clares.

Donato took on the task of constructing the cloister and creating the viali (walkways) and as well as the riggiole (hand-painted tiles used for floorings and walls in the region of Campania).

Giuseppe handled the decoration of the 64 columns, …

…bunches of grapes and leafy branches swirling upwards around them…

….as well as 60 maiolica benches, complete with their backings and tittoli di riggiole(those decorated parts in a curved form similar to those of roofs) depicting scenes of bucolic life…

…and seaside scenes..

Although the 1943 bombing destroyed a good part of the adjacent Basilica di Santa Chiara interior, Ferdinando Fuga’s marble pavement in the church survived.

And the splendid maiolica cloister of the convent of Santa Chiara, too: a Baroque masterpiece not to miss on your next Naples trip.

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