Fourteen works from one of the
most important figures in Italian art history are now exhibited
at Milan's Palazzo Reale until January 10 as part of Expo Milano
2015.
After the successful exhibition of Leonardo Da Vinci's
works,'Giotto, l'Italia' will be the last in the Expo's
six-month season.
Presented officially on Tuesday, the exhibition route was
designed by Mario Bellini, who depicts the path followed by the
Florentine artist through Italy over his approximately 40 years
of activity.
The 14 works, none of which have ever before been exhibited
in Milan, have been placed on large iron altars in
semi-darkness: a "poor" context that aims to exalt the beauty of
the paintings.
Palazzo Reale incorporates the structures of Palazzo di
Azzone Visconti, where Giotto in his last years of life painted
two mural cycles that have since been lost.
In the room on his youth works, there is a fragment of the
'Maestà della Vergine da Borgo San Lorenzo' and the 'Madonna da
San Giorgio alla Costa', which date back to the period of
activity between Florence and Assisi. Also exhibited is the
nucleus of the 'Badia Fiorentina', with the polyptych of the
main altar, the panel with God the Father from the Scrovegni
chapel and Stefaneschi polyptych, a masterpiece painted for the
main altar of St Peter's Basilica.
Milan culture councillor Filippo Del Corno called the
exhibition "an extraordinary event", adding that "never before
have so many Giotto works been included in the same exhibition
project".
The committee tasked with it, he said, has presented a "story
of the history and creative path taken by a great artists who
revolutionized the pictoral canons and in a certain sense was
the founder of modern artistic expression."
Under the aegis of the Italian president's office, promoted
by the culture ministry and the Milan town council with the
sponsorship of the Lombardy region, the exhibition was produced
and organized by Palazzo Reale and the Electra publishing house.
The plan was by Pietro Petraroia (Éupolis Lombardia) and
Serena Romano (University of Lausanne), who are also the
curators of the exhibition. The committee tasked with the
exhibition is under Antonio Paolucci, who called Giotto the
person who "gave shape to the Italian figurative language".
Palazzo Reale director Domenico Piraina expressed a great
deal of pleasure for the "a visionary undertaking that enabled
me to get closer to the 'skin' of painting, making m proud to be
part of humankind."
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