14 Giotto works exhibited in Milan for 1st time

(ANSA) - Milan, September 2 - 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."