Libertà e identità: la fede e l’arte nelle colonie italoamericane negli anni dell’emigrazione di massa. L’esempio di Bartolomeo Boggio

Abstract

Great artworks, even those addressed to a popular public, have not only a simple decorative aim. An interesting example is Bartolomeo Boggio’s canvas of Saint Barbara. The canvas of Saint Barbara painted by this artist (1875-1950) for the Piedmontese Shrine of Cuceglio, at the istance of 81 emigrated miners, reveals the gradual recovery of the intellectual and spiritual impulses in the Italian-American colonies in the difficult years of mass migration and the immigrants’ adjustment to America. In the contest of the flourishing building of national parishes in the first decades of the Twentieth century, the role played by the painters of sacred art as Boggio was fundamental in returning dignity to the Little Italies through a consolidate iconographical heritage. The identity of the United States as “nation of hope” smoothed the way to their activity, but these important works can be correctly understood only in relation to the fundamental concept – defined by Mother Cabrini – of the inseparability of the Italian culture from its religious tradition.

Keywords

• United States of America
• Italian immigration in the USA
• perception of the Italian identity
• art
• spirituality
• Stati Uniti
• immigrazione italiana negli USA
• percezione dell’identità italiana
• arte
• spiritualità