The small church of the Cross is located just before the ancient entrance door to the ancient village of Arcinazzo Romano. The church has an imposing façade which hides a small place of worship with a central plan consisting of an apse and two side chapels.
According to a plaque inside the church, the building dates back to 1778 and its current appearance is due to various restorations during the twentieth century. The facade is austere with some geometric games on the facade and the only decoration is a frieze on the entrance door, which is accessed via a small marble staircase.
The interior is in neoclassical style with painted vaults that make the church full of light and colour.
Two plaques commemorate Giuseppe Troja, artist and shopkeeper, and the painter Tito Troya, whom the inhabitants of Arcinazzo have paid homage to with a copy of his famous painting dedicated to Saint Rita of Cascia.
Tito Troya was born in Arcinazzo Romano in 1849 and died in 1916 and was trained in the seminary of the Subiaco monastery. Thanks to the meeting in Arcinazzo with the painter Luigi Fontana, of whom he became a pupil, Tito Troya approached the current of "Italian purism" which was inspired by fifteenth-century painting.
He had then spent most of his life in Rome, in Borgo Santo Spirito and specialized in the images of Madonnas and Saints that he said came to him in a dream at night.
He worked in the frescoes of the churches of Genazzano, Carpineto Romano and then he dedicated himself above all to the works on canvas that are found in many capitals of the world. Because of this style, he can be considered the father of iconography.
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