Saint John Mourning

It is difficult to distinguish between Cristoforo and Antonio in the body of works produced by their workshop, which, with slight differences in quality, express the same stylistic vision. With greater coherence and a more merciless intensity of cutting and squaring than Amadeo, the Mantegazza brothers carried to the highest degree of visionary violence the “stratigraphic and lamellar interpretation of the Tuscan stiacciato” (G.A. Dell'Acqua), that is, its interpretation in terms of Gothic pathos, in keeping with the typical cautious and traditionalist cultural situation of the North.