Sant'Ignazio Church

Welcome, architecture and art enthusiasts, to the Piazza di Sant'Ignazio. You are standing in one of the most elegantly designed squares in the city, an exquisite example of Rococo urban planning that sets the stage perfectly for…

As you enter the massive Latin cross layout of the nave, I implore you to look directly up. You are gazing upon one of the greatest perspective illusions ever created in the history of art. …

Walk further down the nave, approaching the crossing where the transept meets the main aisle. Look up into the massive, soaring dome overhead. …

Let us step up toward the main altar and examine the presbytery and the curved apse behind it. Once again, Andrea Pozzo commands the space, completing these frescoes in two distinct phases around the turn of the eighteenth…

Moving into the right transept, we arrive at an incredibly lavish structure: the altar of Saint Aloysius Gonzaga. Commissioned by Marquis Scipione Lancellotti and built at the very end of the seventeenth century, this altar was…

Located to the right of the presbytery, we find the Ludovisi Chapel, undeniably one of the most lavishly appointed spaces in the entire church. As we learned outside, Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi was the primary financial…

Let us cross over to the opposite side, the left transept, where we are met by the grandiose altar dedicated to Our Lady of the Annunciation and Saint John Berchmans. This massive structure serves as a direct, architectural…

As we conclude our journey through the Church of Sant'Ignazio and head back toward the Rococo piazza, take one last, sweeping look down the nave. This space is the absolute zenith of Baroque rhetorical architecture. …