Here is a work worthy of Michelangelo in Montreal… that you won’t be able to see

The public can no longer access a historic work of art inspired by Michelangelo’s technique in the Sistine Chapel since the convent where it was made became a condo building.

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“It is a historic work because it is the first fresco by Guido Nincheri that has come down to us. It’s a pity that the public does not have access to it,” laments historian and museologist Paul Labonne.

The large-scale work entitled The Coronation of Mary and created in 1925 inside the ceiling of the chapel at 1420 Mont-Royal, in Outremont, represents the fifteenth of the “mysteries of the rosary”.

We see Mary, mother of Jesus, receiving a crown from the hands of her son. The figures are surrounded by angels and biblical figures.

The building was the motherhouse of the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary. For their chapel, the nuns wanted to reproduce the famous Church of Saint Mary Major in Rome.

The artist chosen to illustrate the scene, Guido Nincheri, was a painter trained in Florence already renowned for his religious work (see box). He will be nicknamed the Michelangelo of Montreal.

“My grandfather loved this work very much. He would certainly be disappointed to learn that the public does not have access to it”, saddens Roger Nincheri, grandson of the artist.

Fan groups

Until 2003, the chapel belonged to the congregation which allowed access to the work during religious services and by appointment.

“We went there with groups of up to 25 people,” says Mr. Labonne, an expert from Nincheri who is now director general of the Museum of Hospitallers at the Hôtel-Dieu.

Access was still possible when the building located at 1420 Mont-Royal, in Outremont, belonged to the University of Montreal. But when it put it up for sale in 2017, visits were suspended.

Since then, two transactions have taken place and the current developer, who has just put 149 luxury units up for sale, wants to leave it to the co-owners to administer the chapel.

“They will decide if they want to make it a theater or something else,” says the head of sales.

Brittle

Trained in Italy in “apse fresco” (fresh plaster), the same technique that Michelangelo had used in Rome for the Sistine Chapel, Nincheri considered the fresco for this convent to be “experimental” because he was the first to apply on the mainland.

“He had given the sisters a two-year credit, saying that he did not know how the fresco would react to the winter climate,” relates Mr. Labonne. Almost a century later, the work is still in excellent condition.

Mr. Labonne, who for a long time managed the Nincheri workshop, adjoining the Château Dufresne, in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, reminds us that a fresco is a very special type of work.

By drying on the wall or ceiling, the painting is integrated into the structure of the building and cannot be moved.

• Guido Nincheri was born in Prato, Italy in 1895 and moved to Montreal in 1914. He made more than 3000 stained glass, paintings and frescoes during the first half of the 20th century.
• He made himself famous in spite of himself for having painted Mussolini in a church in Little Italy. He was imprisoned as an enemy of Canada during the Second World War. He proclaims his innocence, claiming that he was forced by contract to paint the dictator.
• Nincheri’s most imposing fresco is in the Sainte-Amélie church in Baie-Comeau and is even larger than Michelangelo’s on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. “ He is an artist that the public should know as his work is masterful »recounts his biographer, Mélanie Grondin, who devoted approximately 10 years of research and writing, part-time.
• He dies at 87 years in 1973.

Many works of art escape the general public by becoming private collections, deplores a representative of the tourist industry devoted to religious heritage.

“When religious buildings are sold to be transformed into commercial or residential buildings, the works they contain become private property,” explains Sylviane Pilote, project manager at the Religious and Spiritual Tourism Association of Quebec.

1420 Mont-Royal has been the subject of much ink since the University of Montreal acquired it for $15 million in 2003.

growls

As the move of a laboratory begins, the structure of the building proves to be failing. Facing astronomical renovation costs, the establishment puts the building up for sale, provoking the discontent of a group of professors and staff members.

“We were outraged to see our employer dispose of a building of this importance containing a major work of 20th century religious art,” recalls Daniel Turp, who was a professor at the Faculty of Law.

The mobilization is gaining momentum and the group decides to challenge the sale in court.

“Our argument was that the nuns had somehow sold the building at a friendly price to the University of Montreal, saying that they wanted their convent to be used for educational purposes. Selling it to the highest bidder a few years later seemed odious to us. »