San Filippo Neri's bust

The bust, in carved and gilded wood, depicts Saint Philip Neri and was kept in the church of the Madonna della Croce. The Saint wears a dark tunic, a classic priestly gown, covered with a gilded liturgical vestment adorned with motifs in a circle. The prominent hooked nose protrudes from the face. St. Philip has a long, thick beard, accentuated cheekbones, the mouth is painted of red and the eyes are black. Today the face is blackened because it has lost the silver leaf decoration that gave greater value to the work. In the central part of the statue there is an oval case that houses a relic: a fragment of cloth soaked in the blood of the saint, with the inscription << De Tela imbuta sang. S. Philippi Nerii >>. The artefact is concave on the back certainly to allow the action of control and monitoring of the relic contained inside; it is placed on a wooden base, with a quadrangular, post-curved plan. Recently it has undergone a restoration that has improved the readability of the drapery and the face, typical of the production of Neapolitan ancestry ascribable to the first half of the eighteenth century