Part of The Artist Archive, Viridian Eclection's research library of artist biographies and signatures. See also the artist page and the Signature Index.
Look up at the dome of the Cathedral of Saint Paul and you are looking at a colour scheme chosen by a man born on a small square in Florence. Walk its aisles and you pass fourteen bronze Stations of the Cross he modelled in clay. Stand at its Selby and Dayton Avenue entrances and you are surrounded by his carved botanical ornament. For most of the twentieth century, Joseph Angelo Capecchi shaped the visual world of Catholic Minnesota, yet his name rarely appears beside the architects and bishops who are credited with it.
There is a quieter side to the story. In the decades when he was not modelling saints, and especially in retirement, Capecchi painted lakes and woodlands in oil. Those paintings were never commissioned and were never meant for a gallery. They went to family and friends. One of them, or possibly the work of his eldest son, has come to Viridian Eclection. This article sets out what the record actually says about the Capecchis of St. Paul, how to read the signature on a family painting, and where the questions still lie.
Florence: The Piazza Madonna and an Early Hand
Joseph Angelo Capecchi was born on 22 July 1889 on the Piazza Madonna in Florence, the square beside the Medici Chapels at San Lorenzo. The family album kept by his descendants includes a photograph of the square captioned as his birthplace. He trained at an art school in Florence, and the family's record of his work begins remarkably early: a boy carved in marble, completed when he was twelve, and a modelled figure of Saint Paul made as a student work.
Florence at the turn of the century still supported a large population of carvers, modellers and plaster casters who supplied religious statuary to parishes across Europe and the Americas. That trade, rather than the fine art academy alone, is the background that explains everything Capecchi did next.
St. Paul, 1906: The Room Above the Statuary
In 1906 Capecchi left Italy for St. Paul, Minnesota, to work as a sculptor for the Giuliani Statuary Company. The family history gives his age as seventeen; the Star Tribune gives it as sixteen. His birth date in July 1889 makes either figure possible depending on the month he sailed. The Cathedral Heritage Foundation counts him among 1,421 Italian immigrants who arrived in St. Paul in that decade.
According to the family account, he lived in an apartment above the statuary works with other young men and attended night school to learn English. The Giuliani firm was then carrying out interior work at the new Cathedral of Saint Paul, the great domed church designed by Emmanuel Masqueray, and the young modeller was put to work on it almost at once. It was the beginning of a relationship with one building that would last roughly seventy years and three generations of his family.
In 1910 he returned to Italy for compulsory service in the Italian Army. The family records that he was honourably discharged after six months so that he could help a sick brother. He then came back to Minnesota for good.
Marriage, a Shop and a Company
On 16 April 1914 Capecchi married Louise Ungaretti. They had five children: Florence, Joseph E., Bernice, Lois and Paul. According to the Star Tribune, the first daughter was named Florence in honour of her father's birthplace. The couple's fiftieth anniversary is recorded in the family album.
Alongside his statuary work, Capecchi opened the Florentine Art Shop, which imported art objects from Italy. (The family album captions it as the Florentine Import Shop; both names refer to the same business.) In 1929 he became president of the statuary firm, which by then operated as the St. Paul Statuary Company, and he led it through the Great Depression.
One story from these years shows his temperament. In 1928 he sculpted a bust of Al Smith, the Democratic presidential candidate and the first Catholic nominee of a major party. After Smith lost the election, Capecchi destroyed the bust, according to the Star Tribune.
The 1930s and 1940s: Saints for the Campuses
Capecchi's work spread well beyond the Cathedral. In 1932 his statue of Saint Thomas Aquinas was installed above the south entrance of Aquinas Hall at the College of St. Thomas, then the new Liberal Arts Building. The university's archivists describe it as the earliest tribute to the school's namesake to be seen on campus. In 1942 the benefactor I. A. O'Shaughnessy commissioned a second Aquinas work from him, a shrine sculpture on the east side of the Chapel of St. Thomas.
The family record also credits him with altars at the College of St. Catherine, a lunette at the Church of the Nativity in St. Paul, a Saint Anthony and Child for the Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis, and figures of Saint Elizabeth and Kateri Tekakwitha. He modelled the granite statue of the railroad builder James J. Hill in St. Cloud; the family site describes his role as making the model.
The same family archive preserves a 1940 photograph of Capecchi at an easel at Crooked Lake, Wisconsin, painting outdoors. It is the earliest firm date we have for his landscape painting, and it shows that oil painting was a practice running alongside the sculpture, not only a retirement pastime.
The Cathedral Years: 1951 to 1958
The 1950s brought the commissions for which Capecchi is best remembered. The Cathedral Heritage Foundation dates them precisely:
- 1951: the Selby Avenue and Dayton Avenue entrances, with columns and carved botanical ornament.
- 1954: the interior colour scheme of the dome, in red, blue and bright yellow.
- 1956: bronze plaques honouring Archbishop John Murray and the 1936 visit of Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, later Pope Pius XII.
- 1956: the fourteen Stations of the Cross, designed and sculpted by Capecchi and cast in bronze.
- 1958: the plaster model for the Infant of Prague in the Chapel of Saint Joseph.
Of the Stations, his grandson Jerry explained to CBS Minnesota that he modelled them in clay before they were cast. CBS reports that the moulds were destroyed after casting, so the bronzes in the Cathedral are the only examples.
Capecchi also painted the colour sketches for four great mosaics of the cardinal virtues, temperance, fortitude, prudence and justice, each about 25 by 15 feet and set some 70 feet above the floor. The mosaics were executed in Rome by the Vatican Studios, and the Star Tribune names Michelangelo Bedini of those studios as his collaborator. He corresponded with the archbishop about the dome design and supervised the installation of statuary in the church; the Cathedral archive holds an audio recording of Monsignor Ambrose Hayden interviewing him about the work, and film of him overseeing an installation.
He did not advertise his authorship. His grandson Mark told CBS that the old man would praise the mosaics to him, "but he'd never tell me it was his design." In November 2023 newly discovered sketches in the Cathedral brought that authorship back into public view.
Joseph E. Capecchi, "Joe Jr."
Capecchi's eldest son, Joseph E. Capecchi, known as Joe Jr., was born on 18 September 1917. He served in the Second World War from 1941 to 1946. With his brother Paul L. Capecchi he carried out gold leafing at the Minnesota State Capitol, including the Quadriga and the ball at the top of the dome, and in the 1950s the sons painted the Cathedral dome to their father's scheme.
Joe Jr. married Pauline Berger, and they had six children: Joseph G., James, John, Donna, Jerome and Dianne. The family business carried on into the next generation. In the summer of 1976, after an attempted arson in the Cathedral basement left smoke damage throughout the church, Capecchi sons and grandsons cleaned smoke residue from the gilded ceilings. In the 1980s Paul L. and his son Mark repaired water damage. Mark later described gold leaf as so thin it would disintegrate if touched by the fingers.
Joe Jr. died on 24 February 1983, less than a month after his father. The record we have found documents him as a gilder and decorative painter working within the family firm. We have not found any documented easel painting by him, though that absence is not proof that none exists.
Retirement and the Easel
The family's art page states that in retirement Capecchi spent countless hours in his studio with oil paints. His grandson, Dr. Joseph G. Capecchi, notes on his own site that the elder Capecchi was still making art into his eighties and that his works were much in demand from family and friends. He also carved scenes from Aesop's Fables in stone at home and made plaques and busts of family members.
Joseph Angelo Capecchi died on 26 January 1983, aged 93.
Reading the Signature
The painting in our collection is signed at the lower left, in pale paint, with the letters "J. Jr. CAPECCH", the final letter or letters running under the lip of the frame. The surname is unambiguous. The initials are the interesting part, and we set out both readings plainly.
The case for Joseph Angelo Capecchi
Joseph Angelo is the documented painter of the family. There is a dated photograph of him painting a lake landscape outdoors in 1940, and the family states he painted extensively in retirement and gave pictures to family and friends. The subject of our panel, a lake and woodland scene, matches exactly the kind of work the family describes. On subject and documented practice, he is the stronger candidate, and this is the attribution our shop page and listing use.
The case for Joseph E. Capecchi
Joseph Angelo was not a junior. His son Joseph E. was the family's "Joe Jr.", and a "Jr." in the signature most naturally points to him. Joe Jr. was a trained decorative painter, comfortable with brushes and pigment from his work on the Cathedral and the Capitol. If the "Jr." is read literally, the painting is his.
What the signature cannot tell us
We have no published reference signature for either man on an easel painting, so we cannot match letterforms against a known example. We have also not been able to confirm whether Joseph Angelo ever signed with any suffix, or whether the "Jr." might have been added to distinguish a father's picture painted for or with his son. Collectors should note one further family painter: Dr. Joseph G. Capecchi, Joe Jr.'s son, began painting in 2015. His initials and dates do not fit this panel, but any unsigned or later Capecchi landscape should be considered against his work as well.
Our position is that the painting is a Capecchi family work from St. Paul, most probably by Joseph Angelo Capecchi, with Joseph E. Capecchi a real possibility indicated by the signature itself. We would welcome any comparison material from the family.
Style and Subjects
Capecchi's public art was religious and figurative: saints, Stations, plaques and altars, made to be read from a distance and to last. His private painting went the other way. The surviving evidence points to lakes, pines, mountains and open water, painted from life at places like Crooked Lake and, presumably, from memory and imagination in the studio.
A sculptor's training shows in pictures of this kind. Forms are built as solid masses: a tree trunk as a column, a rock shelf as a block, a mountain as a modelled wedge of light and shadow. Colour is used to describe structure rather than to dazzle, which is consistent with a man who chose the dome palette of a cathedral. These are observations about our panel and the type, not claims about a catalogued body of work, which does not yet exist.
Where the Work Is Today
The Capecchi family's public work is unusually easy to see. In St. Paul, the Cathedral of Saint Paul holds the Stations of the Cross, the Selby and Dayton entrances, the Murray and Pacelli plaques, the dome scheme, the Infant of Prague and the four cardinal virtue mosaics from his sketches. The University of St. Thomas has his 1932 Aquinas over Aquinas Hall and the 1942 O'Shaughnessy shrine. The family credits him with work at the College of St. Catherine, the Church of the Nativity and the Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis, and with the model for the James J. Hill statue in St. Cloud. The State Capitol Quadriga carries his sons' gold leaf.
His easel paintings remain almost entirely in private hands, mostly with family and family friends. The family maintains an online archive of his art, which is the best starting point for comparison.
The Market
We have found no auction records for any painting by Joseph Angelo Capecchi or Joseph E. Capecchi. The pictures were made for private giving, not for sale, so there is no public price history to cite. Any value placed on a Capecchi landscape rests on its quality, condition and its direct connection to one of the most important artisan families in Minnesota church history, rather than on comparable sales. We will update this section if verified results appear.
Myths and Corrections
- Age at arrival. Sources disagree: the family history and several articles say seventeen, the Star Tribune says sixteen. Both are possible for a July 1889 birth in a 1906 crossing.
- "He gilded the Cathedral dome." The Star Tribune associates Capecchi with gold leaf work on the dome. The Cathedral Heritage Foundation credits him with the dome colour scheme, and the later painting and gilding were carried out by his sons and grandsons. The family firm as a whole is the safer attribution.
- "He made the mosaics." Capecchi painted the colour sketches. The mosaics themselves were made by the Vatican Studios in Rome.
- The James J. Hill statue. One source credits him with sculpting the granite statue in St. Cloud; the family site credits him with the model. We describe him as its modeller.
- Florentine Art Shop or Florentine Import Shop. Both names appear in the family record for the same import business.
- "Jr." on the signature. Joseph Angelo Capecchi was not a junior. A "Jr." signature should not be assumed to be his without discussion; see Reading the Signature above.
Our Painting
Our Joseph Capecchi Mountain Lake with Fisherman, oil on wood panel, signed, c. 1940 to 1970 shows a tall pine framing the left edge of a still mountain lake, with snow touched peaks across the water and a lone figure fishing from the rocks below. It is painted in oil on a wood panel and signed at the lower left. The panel is in excellent vintage condition. It is a rare chance to own a private painting from the Capecchi family, whose public work is fixed in the walls of the Cathedral of Saint Paul. You can also browse the full Joseph Capecchi collection.
Timeline
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 22 July 1889 | Joseph Angelo Capecchi born on the Piazza Madonna, Florence |
| c. 1901 | Carves a marble figure of a boy at about age twelve |
| 1906 | Emigrates to St. Paul to work for the Giuliani Statuary Company |
| 1910 | Returns to Italy for army service; discharged after six months |
| 16 April 1914 | Marries Louise Ungaretti |
| 18 September 1917 | Son Joseph E. "Joe Jr." Capecchi born |
| 1928 | Sculpts a bust of Al Smith, destroyed after the election |
| 1929 | Becomes president of the St. Paul Statuary Company |
| 1932 | Saint Thomas Aquinas statue installed over Aquinas Hall, College of St. Thomas |
| 1940 | Photographed painting at an easel at Crooked Lake, Wisconsin |
| 1941 to 1946 | Joe Jr. serves in the Second World War |
| 1942 | O'Shaughnessy shrine of Saint Thomas Aquinas, College of St. Thomas |
| 1951 | Selby and Dayton Avenue entrances, Cathedral of Saint Paul |
| 1954 | Designs the dome colour scheme; his sons paint it in the 1950s |
| 1956 | Fourteen bronze Stations of the Cross; Murray and Pacelli plaques |
| 1958 | Plaster model for the Infant of Prague, Chapel of Saint Joseph |
| 1976 | Sons and grandsons clean smoke damage after an attempted arson |
| 26 January 1983 | Joseph Angelo Capecchi dies, aged 93 |
| 24 February 1983 | Joseph E. Capecchi dies |
| 1980s | Paul L. and Mark Capecchi repair water damage in the Cathedral |
| November 2023 | Newly discovered sketches in the Cathedral reported by CBS Minnesota |
Sources
- Cathedral Heritage Foundation, May 2022 newsletter
- CBS Minnesota, newly discovered art in the Cathedral of St. Paul
- The Villager, Italian immigrant played a big role in Cathedral construction
- Star Tribune, the St. Paul cathedral that Capecchi helped build
- University of St. Thomas, Tales from the Archives
- Capecchi Family website, Minnesota Capecchis
- Capecchi Family website, Art of Joseph A. Capecchi
- Capecchi Family website, Family Album
- Capecchi Art, site of Dr. Joseph G. Capecchi
Help Us Complete the Record
If you own a Capecchi painting, have a signed example to compare, or are a member of the Capecchi family with knowledge of who painted under the "J. Jr." signature, we would be glad to hear from you. Corrections and additions make this page more useful to everyone who comes looking for these artists. Contact Viridian Eclection to share what you know or to ask about our painting.