Crema, Sanctuary of Santa Maria della Croce

The shrine, located just outside the city, was built beginning in 1490 on a plan by the architect, Giovanni Battagio from Lodi, of the school of Bramante, to commemorate the apparition of the Madonna in Caterina degli Uberti.
The central plan is cross-shaped resulting from the addition of four chapels to the circular central body, which resembles a high tiburium. A very special effect is created by the contrast between the green domes surmounting the chapels and the red bricks of the building, a chromatic effect enhanced by the white marble emphasizing the entrance doorway and the lunette above it. At the same time, the rapid succession of the single and double lancet windows and the columns of the loggia in three orders, together with the decorative terracotta reliefs, produce a strong dynamic impression. The loggias of the tambour and the conic ceiling of the dome are by Andrea Montanaro from Crema, an architect who substituted Battagio in 1494. Instead, Battagio had planned a calotte-shaped ceiling. The circular structure of the exterior becomes octagonal in the interior, repeating however the rich, lively decorations in brickwork of the exterior. Among the works are the "Epiphany" (1575) and "Deposition" by Bernardino Campi, a painter from Cremona at the end of the 16th century who painted mostly in Cremona, Milan and Sabbioneta, preferring affected decorations; a "Nativity" by Antonio Campi, a painter and engraver of the same period who was already tending towards Mannerism; an "Assumption" by Benedetto Diana, a Venetian painter of the 16th century who came to Crema during the Venetian occupation and was inspired by the colours of Bellini.