Via Superiore, 26, 23014 Andalo Valtellino SO
The first section of the Cammino mariano, leading to the old center of Andalo, cuts midway across the forested slopes of the Orobic Alps, which have historically provided so much work for woodcutters.
The steep mule tracks etched into the mountain flanks are the traces of this traditional activity, their concave beds carved out by the sliding logs.
Andalo was part of the parish of Sant’Abbondio di Rogolo in 1670, when the local heads of families, with the hope of created an independent parish, decided to build a church dedicated to Mary Immaculate. A site suitable for accommodating a sufficiently capacious church was chosen close to the houses. The layout was designed with a nave, side chapels, and a large presbytery.
Completed before the end of the century, the church was decorated in the 18th and 19th centuries by local painters in keeping with the wishes of the community. The most notable artist was Pietro Ligari, glory of 18th-century Valtellina and progenitor of a celebrated family of painters. He is the author of the delightful oval with Mary Immaculate and Child and the Eternal (ante 1718).
The altarpiece in the chapel of the Confraternity of the Rosary is a Madonna of the Rosary with Saints Dominic and Francis (1798) painted by Giovan Francesco Cotta of Morbegno in his later years. The fresco of the Baptism of Jesus behind the baptismal font (19th century) is attributed to Giovanni Gavezzeni of Talamona. The painted vault of the presbytery bears the signature of Costantino Lurati, a little known painter probably active on Lake Como and in Valtellina in the second half of the 19th century.
The central chapel is the most scenic, featuring a polychrome marble altar in typical 18th-century style with a beautiful statue of Our Lady of the Assumption surrounded by cherubs. There are also two excellent Angel Candlebearers on either side of the altar.
In recent years the community has collected and exhibited materials that would otherwise be lost. The clockworks by the Terrile brothers of Recco (province of Genoa), installed in the bell tower in 1927 but soon replaced by an electrical movement, is displayed in a basement room. The “Museo ca de na volta” is located in the rooms adjacent to the presbytery and displays historical rural implements and furnishings.
Behind the church lies the rural settlement of the Carutii, where we find other signs of Marian devotion: a Mary Immaculate frescoed on a large house and a votive aedicula, locally known as the “Gisó di Loca”, installed in 1739 by the Dell’Oca family.
