Church of Santa Maria and Santi Pietro e Paolo in Pilzone
The parish church of Pilzone replaces a previous 16th Century structure, whose walls were partly used. Originally dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul, in the mid 16th Century the name of St. Mary of the Assumption was added. Following the traditional orientation, the present building, a 17th Century structure restored in more recent times, stands within the area bordered by the highway and the railway line, next to the station.
Overlooking a small churchyard, the front façade faces the lake and has two orders interspersed by pilasters and the broken gable. Four niches, two per register, house the statues of Saints Peter, Paul, Thomas and Charles Borromeo (20th Century).
The interior, a single nave church with 19th Century altars, boasts good, but not excellent, 19th Century decoration, renovated during the following century, with some interesting aspects. The sanctuary is quite remarkable, and worthy of note are the altarpiece, dated 1741, with the Virgin in glory and the saints Peter, Francis, Aloysius Gonzaga and Charles Borromeo, assignable to Domenico Voltolini from Brescia, who also performed, perhaps with the help of the workshop, the numerous frescoes in the sanctuary, which conclude in the centre of the dome with the Assumption of the Virgin. The large 18th Century painting of the Communion of the Apostles on the second altar on the right, dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament, inserted in an even older fine wooden altarpiece, is based on Venetian models. To the right of the sanctuary hangs a Madonna and Child with Saints Dominic and Catherine of Siena (Our Lady of the Rosary), dated 1608, which is part of the post Moretto Brescian production, with some affinity with Pietro Marone, who was already deceased on those dates.
Fiorella Frisoni