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a city, where perseverance in applying
itself to one theme only was certainly not one of it’s
principle characteristics;
between the end of the 16th century and the first twenty years of the
18th century, an unusual phenomenon occurred, something which
has never been seen in the entire history of this population,
neither before or afterwards. During a period of increasing formal
expression and quality, which reached it’s peak
between the 60’s and 80’s of the XVIII century, the
neapolitan population of all social levels, prepared christmas cribs. In
the circles where the
economical and cultural conditions
existed, cribs of
such an impressive artistic value were produced that an enormous
interest surrounded them, in fact they were mentioned in the chronicles
of the time and noted down in the diaries of foreign travellers who
visited Naples in the 17th century.
Why
such perseverance ? Why was it that the constructions representing
this religious event flourished in the whole
of the catholic world, and lasted for so long ? We can start off
by saying that this perseverance could exist and continue
to exist only if the spirit and the
basis were of a genuine nature; to stimulate this there was the
need to find a symbol : and as a symbol for the population there was
nothing better than religious faith.
The involvement in the birth of the Holy Baby was so intense and
so deeply felt that the wish to represent the religious moment made many
commit mistakes in the
sequence of events, changing the consistency and logic, and
not even hesitating to represent “The Mystery” in his own
era, in the familiar countryside among well known people
recognizable in the
small, dressed up figures,
in the dream coming true, in the global vision of apparent reality. What other energy existed, to bring to the crib such truth ?
what other power could stand side by side with the faith ?
Carefully
analysing the time and the ambience in which the events were maturing,
it is helpful to remember that the man of the 17th century was
developing a thirst for knowledge, an indipendant
train of thought, a freedom of mind, a curiosity to understand
nature and the personality of mankind.
Therefore,
the rococo scene, conditioned by the domineering classes
(the government,clergy and aristocracy), was opposed to by
another tendency having a
completely different bases
: the beliefs of the middle-classes. Strangely enough, the obstinate
intention of trying
to dispel these
differences at all costs, found
in Naples, in the making of christmas cribs, fertile ground. In what way?
Certainly
without knowledge, unconciously, and in any case on every
occasion in which it was possible to let it’s imagination roam, in
giving form to a magnificent construction
trying to replicate real
life, including each minute detail describing the scenes inspired both
from every day life to
those only imagined; in the
complexity of scenes and
buildings shown in detail with their various levels, angles and views;
in a reproduction of the environment appearing in an extremely realistic
prospective, with the intention of stimulating the feeling of
spaciousness. Documents confirming theses opinions exist, they
are the cronicles and manuscripts drawn
up in the 17 TH century. Even though they were by authors of different
nationalities, written in the space of a hundred years, with opinions
both flattering and disparaging ( speaking of the neapolitan crib as an
artistic form); all the writings have a common denominator : they all
agree on an overall positive opinion, and the
point of view regarding
the perspectives. Reading
these opinions again transmits a clear and unambiguous reference to the
main figurative symbol of the century.
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