Grazioso Rusca

Originally from Rancate in the Swiss canton of Ticino, he was trained as a stonemason by architects including Simone Cantoni. He worked at the Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo di Milano in Milan where he created reliefs for the cathedral's facade. In the 1880s, he worked with Austrian architect Leopold Pollack at the College of Pavia, creating two large statues representing Philosophy and Theology. From 1796 to 1797, his decorations for the Palazzo Belgioioso included bas-reliefs depicting Napoleon as Hercules helping Italy. In Bergamo's Cappella Colleoni, he sculpted the two angels supporting Pollack's altar table. Again working with Pollack in Bergamo, he decorated the high altar at Santa Maria Maggiore and created the bas-reliefs of Apollo and the muses at the Palazzo Agosti. In 1805, he replaced Carlo Maria Giudici at the Fabbrica del Duomo, earning him a position of great prestige as head of one of the major sculpture workshops of the times. His son, Gerolamo and his nephew Antonio also were employed by the Fabbrica del Duomo.

• Madonna del Rosario, San Bernardino, Milan • High altar statue, Santa Maria Nuova, Milan • Statua della Pace (1802), Cremona • Dii Consentes (c. 1812), Palazzo Saporiti, Milan • Sculptural decorations, Arco della Pace, Milan • Statue of the Redeemer, Santa Maria del Carmine, Milan • St Augustin and the child on the beach, Basilica of San Gaudenzio, Novara