Specific typology: church Structural configuration: The complex of the church of S. Maria is composed of the church, with a single nave with presbytery and rectangular side chapels and the bell tower, placed between the church and the parish house. On the left side of the façade rests an arch that connects the church with the neighbouring house and on the right side of the church is the parish house. The buildings consist of a stone wall, which in the case of the bell tower is exposed and in the case of the church it’s visible only on the north side, while on the other free sides it’s plastered and painted. Construction period: 1708 Architect:TarilliGiovan Battista, church, first and second left span, paintings, Giovanni Tarilli, church, first and second left span, paintings, Carloni Carlo Innocenzo, church, main facade, project/church, frescoes; Diego Francesco Carloni, church, main facade, project/church, stucco/church, statues; Molciani Giovanni Battista, church, presbytery, altar frontal; GarvoAllio Tommaso, church, high altar, small temple, Pietro Verzetti, church, main façade, fresco; GaspareDe Angeli, church, counter-façade, holy water container The Church, with a single nave, has two side chapels on each side, the chapels of the Baptistery and of the Crucifix on the left, that of Saint Monica and the chapel called "deiGenovesi" on the right. The starting point for the 18th-century redevelopment was the testamentary legacy of Giovan Battista Carloni, father of Diego and Carlo Innocenzo, who ordered 900 lire for the renewal of the choir. From the codicil, affixed to the will of 26 February 1718, it’s clear that the legate was fulfilled still being Giovanni Battista alive in 1710. Since 1711, Diego Carloni has been active in the church for the stucco decorations since 1724, for the frescoes, Carlo Innocenzo. The work of the two brothers continued, with long interruptions, for several decades: if for Diego the last known date is 1741, when the statues of Saints Nazaro and Celso, patrons of Scaria were placed on the façade with elegantly modulated forms, we know that Carlo Innocenzo completed in 1751 the side frescoes of the presbytery and that, in the winter of 1751-52, he executed the two altarpieces depicting the crucifixion with the saints Rocco and Sebastiano and of the Madonna with the Child and Saint Monica for the eponymous chapels. The conclusion of the works is perhaps after the death of Diego in 1750, as seems to suggest the date 1753 marked on the floor. The scarcity of the archival documentation is explained by the fact that the paintings, frescoes and stuccos were mostly offered by the Carloni brothers as a sign of attachment to the church of the native town, according to a custom of the Como, Vallintelvese and Ticino craftsmen, of which we find other examples in Rovio, in the parish church of Santi Vitale and Agata and in the church of Santa Maria, for which various exponents of the Carloni di Rovio family of the Genoese and Turin branch were active, and in the splendid decoration of the vault of the church of San Martino in Castello di Valsolda, offered by Paolo Pagani in 1697. Despite the long-time span of the works, interrupted by the frequent commitments of Diego and Carlo InnocenzoCarloni on large transalpine sites and northern Italy that kept them away from their native land, the whole is perfectly unified. The harmonious fusion of architecture, painting and stucco plastic apparatuses makes the complex an absolutely typical example of the baroque ideal of Gesamtkunstwerk. Despite the predominantly Carlonian imprint, the interior of the church preserves evidence of the work of other Intelvese masters.
Next to the entrance, the marble holy water container with a figure of a sitting angel was made and offered, as indicated in the inscription, by GiovanGaspare De Angelis in 1607. In 1635, the "Genoese chapel" received a testamentary given by the sculptor GiovanGaspare De Angelis, long active in Genoa: the Genoese school is in fact the altarpiece of the Madonna and saints attributed to Giovanni Carloni. The high altar, surmounted by a marble temple by Antonio Silva di Lanzo (1709-1710), contains a late-century frontal in scagliola attributed to Giovan Battista Molciani. Among the carvings of the wooden pulpit (1781) appears the corn cob (in the Carlòn dialect), the "speaking" emblem of the Carloni family of Scaria. Historical information While the parish of Saints Nazaro and Celso, isolated from the town, is an important testimony of the history and art of the Vallintelvese period in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the parish of Santa Maria, located in the heart of the town, is linked to the family epic deiCarloni and the great artistic flowering of Vallintelvese in the Baroque and Rococo periods. Originally from the 15th century, its original appearance, before the Baroque transformations, was handed down to us from the description contained in the documents of the pastoral visit of Bishop FelicinoNinguarda of 1593, but only a few fragments of frescoes survive today from this older phase. The current Baroque facade is the result of the commitment, which took over fifty years by various members of the Carloni family flanked by other local artistic craftsmen. Current use: whole well: church Historical use: whole well: church Legal status: property Catholic religious body.