I Am Not What I Am: JAGO Revisited

The Moor and his Bride

Almost two years have passed since I first published my article on the artist Jago and the bizarre matrix of symbols that haunt his oeuvre like ghosts. And as anyone who has seen Jago’s work can attest— these ghosts are a bit lacking in taste. Jago’s talent as an artist is so paltry, his statues so kitsch, that the aesthetic value of his work is even more offensive than it is sacrilegious. The concerted effort by the media and the church to paint the sculptor as a new Michelangelo is a sin against art and an insult to anyone with eyes. In Mozambique, there is a folk belief that bald men have gold in their heads, but one look at Jago’s Pieta proves that his skull is full of nothing but pyrite— fools gold with hints of sulfur.

Jago and his creations had not crossed my mind in many months, (surely a great mercy from God), that is up until a few weeks ago when I noticed a poster outside the theater near my apartment. It appears that the powers that be have gifted him his own documentary.

I decided that this was as good a time (sign?) as any to revisit our favorite astroturfed sculptor.

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Jacopo Cardillo’s (born 1987) meteoric rise from a nobody to a darling of the art world occurred practically overnight. (There is a thief pun to be made somewhere). The earliest listed work of his is Ego laurentius which was produced in 2007. The narrative usually makes it out as if in 2009 he exploded in popularity with his bust of Pope Benedict XVI. This bust attracts the attention of the Vatican and the art world, and it begins his long relationship with the Church as his patron. Then, as the story goes, in 2013 Jago had the “genius” idea to alter the bust after Benedict XVI resigned. He strips the statue of its vestments, the symbols of papal authority, leaving wrinkled and veristic flesh underneath. Two elements are noteworthy. He adds the missing eyes to the bust, and he does not remove the Fisherman’s Ring. The altered work was titled Habemus Hominem. From this point, his career takes off, both with the Church and the art world at large.

But there are many issues with this narrative.

The original bust was very uncharacteristic of Jago. The statue was completely lacking in the signature detail that characterizes Jagos work. The statue also lacked eyes. In 2009 the statue looked, well, unfinished. After Benedict’s resignation, he chips away the smooth vestments to reveal the intricate body beneath. And he adds eyes to the statue. Uncanny eyes that follow you. (Again, reread the original article). It was a very specific optical effect, one which it’s hard to believe could have been added if he did not already have it in mind in 2009.

But how could some art world nobody in 2009 predict that Benedict would one day resign?

A year and a half ago, I speculated that the statue may have been commissioned by a shadowy patron with foreknowledge of this resignation, with the intention of stripping the bust away when Ratzinger finally stepped down. Sound crazy? Well…

Someone in the Vatican actually commissioned him to create the original bust. (source 1) (source 2). Why— and who— in the Church chose Jago, a nobody at the time, for this work?

In 2012, Jago received a Pontifical Medal for his unfinished bust of Benedict, from Cardinal Ravasi and Cardinal Bertone. (Source.) If you do not recognize the name Bertone, I will quote the last article:

Cardinal Bertone. A wicked, terrifying figure. Believed to be one of the kingmakers behind the ascension of Pope Francis, and all the machinations involved. At the time the Secretary of State for the Holy See. There are also reports that he was part of the alteration and cover up of the Third Secret of Fatima, that he was behind the dismissal of Abp Vigano. Remember, it was Vigano who was investigating the IOR (Vatican Bank) and the massive corruption and money laundering that was occurring there. Bertone is accused of “mismanaging” millions of IOR money, and lived and extremely lavish lifestyle. He is also widely believed to be a Freemason.

In the last article, we advanced the thesis that Jago’s benefactors picked the young man to play a specific artistic role. To advance certain themes and symbols. I hypothesized that whoever these individuals were, they played a part in the intimidation and coercion of Pope Benedict XVI, and that they had ties to clerical masonry. Anyone who has been following my work knows this is not far-fetched. As the reputable Italian Brigadier General Laporta stated:

But I do not want to spend this article covering old ground. It is my intention to bring forward new information, advancing and confirming my thesis.

Let us begin with the Masonic angle. I would like to touch on a new discovery of mine that reinforces the fact that Jago is explicitly employing masonic imagery in his work.

As discussed previously, Jago’s Veiled Son (2019) was explicitly based on the Veiled Christ of the Sansevero Chapel, and to further the connection to the original work, Jago’s statue was also for a time exhibited in the same building.

And what is even more fascinating, and damning, is the story behind the original Veiled Christ statue and the church it is in. The Sansevero Chapel. A Chapel explicitly linked to Freemasonry. Probably the most explicitly linked chapel to Freemasonry in the entire world. And this is not some veiled (pardon the pun) conspiracy, this is freely admitted and explained on even the official Naples visitor website. To demonstrate how well known this is, I’ll post an excerpt from the official site on the chapel.

So we have our first masonic commission. I have recently discovered that he had an earlier and lesser-known work, that was even more explicitly masonic. The Monumento al Libero Pensiero (Monument to Free Thought) in Arezzo. It was erected in 2016 and then destroyed, which is why I originally missed it.

The monument was dedicated to Tommaso Baldassarre Crudeli (1702-1745). Crudeli is considered the first martyr of Universal Masonry. Tommaso was initiated in 1735, into an offshoot of the Grand Lodge of England, the first Masonic Lodge in Italy. He was imprisoned and tortured by the Roman Inquisition for his involvement in masonry, eventually succumbing to wounds caused by his captors. For this, he became a masonic martyr. His name is emblematic of the struggle between masonry and the Catholic Church.

So why is an artist whose career was made by the Church, whose work is featured in prominent churches, creating monuments to Freemasonic martyrs who struggled against the Church?

But it gets worse. Jago’s Monumento al Libero Pensiero immediately brings to mind another Monumento al Libero Pensiero, in fact, if you google Jago’s rendition, one of the first search results is the other, the Monumento a Giordano Bruno. The famous statue in Campo de Fiori. A monument that Jago used as inspiration for his own.

This statue was erected in the late 19th century to honor Giordano Bruno. Bruno was not a mason, but he is claimed by Masons as a hero, and Bruno was burned by the church as a heretic. Bruno was a genius, a man I personally admire, and a man who would have despised many aspects of the modern Masonic project. But the erection of this statue was explicitly Masonic.

The statue was unveiled on 9 June 1889, at the site where Bruno was burnt at the stake for heresy on 17 February 1600, and the radical politician Giovanni Bovio gave a speech surrounded by about 100 Masonic flags. Since thousands of individuals and students aligned with anticlerical movements had congregated in Rome for the unveiling, the Vatican had closed the museum and warned local churches and parishes to shutter their doors to avoid confrontations or incidents from what they considered an atheistic mob. In October 1890, Pope Leo XIII issued a further warning to Italy in his encyclical Ab Apostolici against Freemasonry; he commented on the monument in the following passage:

“that eminently sectarian work, the erection of the monument to the renowned apostate of Nola, which, with the aid and favour of the government, was promoted, determined, and carried out by means of Freemasonry, whose most authorised spokesmen were not ashamed to acknowledge its purpose and to declare its meaning. Its purpose was to insult the Papacy; its meaning that, instead of the Catholic Faith, must now be substituted the most absolute freedom of examination, of criticism, of thought, and of conscience: and what is meant by such language in the mouth of the sects is well known.”

And the artist of the Bruno statue is even more revealing. Ettore Ferrari. Ettore was a sculptor and the Grand Master of the Grande Oriente d'Italia, the main Masonic body in Italy. (When he created the statue he was not yet grand master).

Is this what Jago is being groomed to be? This generation of Italian Masons own Ettore Ferrari? Was his Monumento al Libero Pensiero a wink and a nod to Ettore’s?

Jago’s flirtation with Massoneria is undeniable. And the fact that the Papal bust that brought him fame was both commissioned by individuals in the vatican, and seems to imply foreknowledge of Benedicts resignation is too blatant to ignore. But it is time to get far stranger.