THE FESTIVAL LOCATIONS
The XIII edition of the festival will be hold in two beautiful churches, St. Magdalene's Church and St. Annunziata's Church. Both monuments, located in the historic centre of Pesaro, are deconsecrated and nowadays they host cultural events.
ST. ANNUNZIATA'S CHURCH
The church, founded in 1347 by the Blessed Cecco and the Blessed Michelina Metelli for the burial of the poor and care of the indigent was the property of the Confraternity of the Annunziata. It was built during the second half of the 14th. century on the site of the Blessed Michelina’s house, which she had donated to the confraternity in 1356. The building was completely restructured around the middle of the 17th. century and modified during 1714-’15, with the inclusion in the abs of The Annunciation, a scenic stucco altarpiece, one of the finest works by the Bolognese sculptor Giuseppe Mazza (1653 -1741). Two years after the suppression of the confraternity, in 1784, the church passed to the Mosca family who commissioned the trompe l’oeil painting in the dome and the figures of saints in the fake niches. The result is an elegant 18th. century building, with refined interior decoration of alternating pastel shades. There are two funerary monuments at the side altars, to Benedetto Mosca and Barbara Anguissola with their daughter Bianca on the right, and on the left the monument to the wife of Raimondo Mosca Barzi, Lucrezia Belluzzi. When the Mosca family died out in 1938, the building reverted to the diocese, and was bought in 1998 by the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Pesaro, which financed its restoration by the architect Celio Francioni in 2000. The church is now used for cultural events and exhibitions.
summary based on Federica Tesini, Pesaro. Itineraries of a city of art, Pesaro, Arti Grafiche Pesaresi Editore, 2009, p. 33