Art
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Gandosso is a little agricultural centre, located on the hills that dominate the river Oglio and the lower part of Lake Iseo. The built-up-area is developed on a vast space, but you can recognise a centre in the agglomeration of houses, among which the parish Church, dedicated to Assumption and built in 1679 in baroque style, rises. The outside is characterised by a picturesque facade, divided in orders laid one upon the other and concluded by a curious curvilinear tympanum. You immediately notice the polished portal and several details plastically defined. Inside some works by Fantoni are much more interesting than the structure, for instance the engraved wooden pulpit with sober and fine inlaid landscapes (1692). The main altar, that strikes for the refined design and the polychromy of the materials used (ancient green, marbles, lapis-lazuli), is by Andrea Fantoni and can be dated back to 1694. The altar of the Rosary, adorned by a frontal medal with relieves of marble statues. The relics case (1692) in gilt and polychromatic wood with putti and cherubs’ heads.
The walls are embellished by several Venetian School’s paintings of the XVII-XVIII century, among which the following ones stand out. The Annunciation by an unknown painter of the XVI century, St. Joseph’s dream and the Nativity by Gerolamo Castelli of 1771; on the right side on the presbyter is the Washing of feet (XVII century) ascribed to Antonio Balestra.
The bell tower, rising in severe shapes beside the church, can be dated back to the XVII century.
Not without interest is the Sanctuary of the Madonna of the Castle, built on the ridge of the homonymous mountain, close to the perish church. Inside it preserves a Way of the Cross of the XV century and some peculiar Ex votes.
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History
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This little centre of the Calepio Valley, positioned on the hilly strip almost overlooking the mouth of the Oglio River and of the low Iseo Lake, was a simple town district of Castelli Calepio up to the beginning of the XVIII th century and, as a consequence, underwent its historic and military vicissitudes.
The built-up area, a little scattered on the verdant hilly slope full of caves and hollows, is worthy of attention for its northern complex, where, beside a group of houses from which a fantastic and wide view on the low Iseo Lake opens, the seventeen-century Parish Church dedicated to the Annunciation catches the eye: it was risen in 1679 following a plan by Andrea Fantoni.
At the inside, some works of art by Fantoni are kept, as the wooden pulpit with delicately carved decorations of landscapes and the refined major altar-piece in variegated marbles; there are several paintings of the XVII and XVIII th century of Venetian school; a “Nativity” (1771) by Gerolamo Castelli, a “Washing of Feet” (XVII th century) attributed to Antonio Balestra and an “Annunciation” (altar-piece) by a sixteen-century unknown artist. The recent restoration of its front is worthy of attention; it has brought out its elegance and ornaments.
In the main complex, near to the Parish Church, some old dwellings catch the eye, among which the high-class palace of the Gonzaga Counts once used to stand, today irreparably compromised in its original architectonic structure of the early XVIII th century.
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Positioned at the top of the road that licks the little church courtyard and next to the church itself, we find the Parish House, built on the ruins of a little fortress, which can be externally known by some traces of outer walls with two rough casts of small turrets at their sides.
The hall, today sometimes used as a cellar, and the colonnade, which opens on the inner courtyard, are extremely beautiful.
The Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Castle is also interesting, built on a ridge of the mountain having the same name in the eastern part of the town, at a few distance from the Parish Church.
At the inside, it keeps a fifteen-century “Way of The Cross” and some peculiar “Votive Offerings”.
All around the tiny built-up area, visible by running the road that quickly leads back to Villongo, there are several country farmsteads, old architectural witnesses of a rural past.
On the top of the mountain, where today an iron cross stands, it seems that a medieval tower once used to rise, demolished by the French Armies at the end of the XVIII th century.
The circular open space is externally bounded by low dry massive walls, by a ditch which follows its perimeter and by a rough flight of steps made in the living rock. Such elements seem to allow us to assume the past existence of a proto-historic fortified village, built in an elevated spot.
In the lower part of the territory, towards Credaro, the “Molere” are worthy of notice; they are hollows where, already during the Roman Age, big wheat grindstones were built; it was an activity which has gone on many centuries until the decisive giving up after the war.
It’s a suggestive spot, which reminds us of the hard work of man and of the strong bond with the land, where the techniques of digging out in the rock made by the grindstones are still visible, left unfinished by the last quarrymen.
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