Explosive outlook for Michelangelo church

ROME - Italian environmentalists have launched a campaign to save a dazzling Michelangelo church from ruin after the use of explosives on the underlying Tuscan hillside raised fears the 16th-century building could face imminent collapse.

A large crack has already ripped through the marble pavement, ancient tombs, altar and baptismal font of the Romanesque chapel in the hamlet of Fabiana, near Lucca.

The church nestles midway up the Altissimo hill, at the foot of which Michelangelo arrived in 1517 in search of the area's distinctive marble he intended to use for the facade of the church of San Lorenzo in Florence.

Experts in Tuscany believe the widespread practice of blasting the area's sought-after marble from the caves underneath the chapel could spell disaster for the fragile building.

"The danger of collapse is real," Enrico Mazzucchi, the local mayor, told Corriere della Sera yesterday.

"We started a restoration plan for the area and challenged the quarry that continues to operate under the Altissimo. As far as we are concerned their concession expired last year."

The firm, Cava Viti, contests this claim and a local court is to decide on the long legal battle in March.

Ermes Luppi, the church's parish priest, has applied for help to Tuscany's cultural heritage department, which earmarked 130,000 ($226,000) for the restoration of the church loggia, attributed to Michelangelo and damaged during World War II, and the rose window built by the artist to embellish the romanesque structure.

But until the row over the impact of marble extraction is resolved, the money cannot be spent for fear that the restored church will tumble down.

"It's a cruel joke," said Luppi. "Everything is frozen until the settling stops. Otherwise there is the risk of restoring a church only for it to fall down, also wasting the money.

"Years of work have created a huge hole that threatens to devour everything - our church and the village.

"We have done everything we can to save what can be saved but there is no action, only promises."

Each summer the hamlet attracts sculptors from Britain, Australia, the US and Japan to attend summer schools inspired by the local marble and the spirit of Michelangelo.

Some of the columns from the church loggia have been stolen, but others are stored at a warehouse "ready to be restored to give birth to a new masterpiece," the Corriere said, "if the explosives and neglect allow".

Mazzucchi insists local authorities will win the struggle with the quarry operators. "The chapel must be safeguarded. The council will fight this all the way."

- INDEPENDENT