The Church of San Filippo Neri, also called the Church of the Immaculate Conception or Chiesa Nuova, is one of the most important places of worship in Perugia and among the finest examples of Baroque architecture in the city.
What to see
Built on the site of nine houses, several workshops and an ancient early Christian church, construction began in 1627 to a design by the Roman architect Paolo Maruscelli, who had already worked for the Oratorians in Rome; like its model, the Roman church of Santa Maria della Vallicella, also known as Chiesa Nuova, the building follows Counter-Reformation canons with a single nave designed to foster the congregation's recollection. The travertine facade, inspired by Vignola-derived models, was completed by 1665, thanks largely to the support of the vicar Marcantonio Degli Oddi.
The interior, with its typically Baroque upward spatial sweep, is decorated with a rich array of frescoes and canvases from the 17th and 18th centuries: the dome was frescoed in 1728 by Francesco Mancini with the Coronation of the Virgin, while on the high altar, designed by Tommaso Stati, stands the grand Immaculate Conception painted in 1662 by Pietro da Cortona. Numerous side chapels house works by Bernardino Gagliardi, Anton Maria Fabrizi, Giovanni Andrea Carlone and other masters; the church's most grievous loss, however, was Guido Reni's Assumption of the Virgin, seized by the French in 1797 and now held at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Lyon. Attached to the complex, the Oratorio di Santa Cecilia, built between 1687 and 1690 for the Oratorians' musical exercises, is the city's only other fully Baroque monument.
Visiting
The church is open for worship according to service times; on Passion Friday it hosts the annual Desolata, a sacred performance with the Cantori Umbri.
Our editors' tip
Standing before Pietro da Cortona's canvas on the high altar, consider that Guido Reni's Assumption once hung beside it: two masterpieces side by side, of which only one remains today, the other seized by Napoleon and never returned to Perugia.
