January 2026. After 170 years, the paintings on the San Rocco Bridge are revived.
FUMAGALLI MOBILI - Thu 08 Jan -
170 years later.
1856-2026. San Rocco Bridge. Vimercate.
In 1856, the painter Gaetano Barabini created a fresco on the San Rocco Bridge, now lost but deeply rooted in the history and memory of the city.
The iconographic choice—the Madonna and Child flanked by Saints Roch and Christopher—recalls an even older tradition, likely born after the great plague of 1629–1631, when sacred images were placed on bridges, gates, and city boundaries as a sign of collective protection.
It is likely that a 17th-century votive image already existed on the bridge, repainted several times over the centuries, until Barabini's 19th-century renovation. His intervention did not invent a new subject, but rather renewed a devotion that has endured through time.
170 years after Barabini's work, this project reactivates that memory through contemporary language:
From a collaborative project with three artists—Stefano, Giovanni, and Emilio Gianni—we will create a video projection of historical images on the eastern façade of the bridge, temporarily bringing back to the urban space an image that has defined its meaning for centuries.
Not a physical reconstruction, but a gesture of light and time, bringing history, place, and the present into dialogue.
With the collaboration of ProLoco and the patronage of the Municipality of Vimercate, as part of the Sagra di Sant'Antonio (Sagra of St. Anthony), music by the Ichichè band, and mulled wine from the Vimercate Alpine troops, we look forward to seeing you at the inauguration of the art exhibition at our exhibition space at Via Cavour 89, Friday, January 16, 2026:
6:00 PM / Exhibition inauguration. TRIALOGO
7:00 PM / Video projection inauguration. SOGNO NEL TEMPO.
