| Renaissance Masters Hold Court on the East Coast This Fall | |
| A 2005 Preview of Special Exhibitions by Stan Parchin |
About the shows:
While California will be basking this Fall in the glories of ancient Egypt with three major special exhibitions on view at the same time (Hatshepsut: From Queen to Pharaoh, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs and Mummies: Death and the Afterlife in Ancient Egypt -- Treasures from the British Museum), the East Coast will be resplendent with six spectacular shows on Renaissance art. Three will be in our nation's capital. And New York will have its own triumvirate of displays, all within a short walking distance of one another. Five of them will carry through to the Winter.
Washington, DC's National Gallery of Art is the only American museum to present Origins of European Printmaking: Fifteenth-Century Woodcuts and Their Public from September 4 to November 27, 2005. 140 early woodcuts, books and related objects explore the printmaking revolution in fifteenth-century Europe and the influence of mass-produced images on late-medieval culture. The inexpensive process made it possible for Europeans from all walks of life to own a print, often of a religious subject. Maps and other publications were also affordably produced and easily circulated as a result of printing. On loan from various European and American public and private collections, the exhibition will feature such images as those designed for pilgrimages, exorcisms and application for an indulgence to remove days from one's stay in purgatory.
Austrian
Saint Jerome Removing a Thorn from the Lion's Paw,
ca. 1430
Colored woodcut
27.1 x 19.3 cm (10 11/16 x 7 5/8 in.)
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna
The National Gallery of Art is also the sole venue for Monumental Sculpture in Florence: Ghiberti, Nanni di Banco, and Verrocchio at Orsanmichele from September 18 to December 31, 2005. Orsanmichele was a civic and religious center in late-medieval and Renaissance Florence. It was closed to the public 21 years ago so that the 14 statues that fill its exterior niches could be restored. With the project nearing completion, three of the sculptures have been allowed to travel to the United States, two for the first time. The exhibition will include Saint Matthew by Lorenzo Ghiberti (ca. 1378-1455), the famous Quattro Santi Coronati (Four Crowned Martyred Saints) by Nanni di Banco (ca. 1374-1421) and Christ and Saint Thomas by Andrea del Verrocchio (ca. 1435-1488), previously seen in 1993 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ghiberti's Saint Matthew, oversized at 8' 10", is a masterpiece of bronze casting. The marble Quattro Santi Coronati demonstrates Nanni di Banco's profound understanding of Roman antique sculpture. And Verrocchio's innovative bronze pair of Christ and Saint Thomas breaks free from the architectural confines of the niche in which it was placed, its drama spilling out to the viewer.
Monumental Sculpture in Florence... follows on the coattails of the National Gallery of Art's special exhibition on the scientific investigation and restoration of Verrocchio's David in 2003. When the statues return to Florence early next year and Orsanmichele reopens to the public, they and their companions will be on view in an interior hall of the church. The niches will display replicas of the restored artworks.
View of Lorenzo Ghiberti’s Saint Matthew
(1419-1421), as it was installed before
conservation at Orsanmichele, Florence, Italy
Alinari/Art Resource, NY
Manuscripts in Miniature: Italian Manuscript Illumination from The J. Paul Getty Museum from September 25, 2005 to January 2, 2006 completes the NGA's trio of Renaissance art shows. Illuminated manuscripts and miniatures from Italy during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance are the focus of this show, culled from the renowned collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum in Malibu, CA and enhanced by contributions from the NGA.
The Frick Collection on East 70 Street in New York City is the last stop of a three-city international tour for Memling's Portraits. On view from October 12 to December 31, 2005, the show focuses on the portrait painting of the Netherlandish artist Hans Memling (ca. 1440-1494) and his contemporaries. Memling's Northern Renaissance portraits are known for their vivid colors, grace, exacting attention to detail and use of disguised symbolism. His oil on wood Portrait of a Praying Man (ca. 1480-1485) from the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, last seen here in a special exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art 25 years ago, is a devotional painting of a man in religious contemplation. The reverse side of the panel features a still life with a decorated jug containing two kinds of flowers resting on a table. The white lilies represent the Virgin Mary's purity while the purple irises are a common, Renaissance artistic device symbolizing the Virgin's sorrow because of her son's impending fate.
Some 30 portraits, individual as well as from diptychs (two-panel masterpieces) and triptychs (three-panel compositions), form the core of the show. The American version of Memling's Portraits will feature additional paintings that will explore the importance of the workshop in the production of artworks.
Hans Memling (ca. 1440-1494)
Portrait of a Praying Man, ca. 1480-1485
Oil on wood
Sammlung Thyssen-Bornemisza, Schloss Rohoncz
Castagnola, Spain
Twelve blocks north of The Frick Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art will play host to two special exhibitions on Italian Renaissance painters. Fra Angelico will take up residence on the ground level of the Robert Lehman Wing from October 26, 2005 to January 29, 2006. More than 50 American and European museums and private collections are lending 80 paintings, drawings and manuscript illuminations by the Italian Renaissance master to this comprehensive survey of his work, complemented by some 45 additional works by five of his assistants and followers. Included in the show will be newly discovered works, recent attributions, paintings never before displayed in public and groups of works reassembled, some reunited for the first time since their production.
Fra Angelico (1390/5-1455), a member of the Dominican order, received commissions for religious altarpieces from many parts of Italy. The Angelic Painter's technical skill and psychological depth, evident in his works, allowed him to dominate the Tuscan art scene for nearly 30 years, having surpassed the careers of virtuoso painters such as Fra Filippo Lippi (1406-1469) and Domenico Veneziano (1410-1461). Largely known for his frescoes in the monastic cells of the convent of San Marco in Florence, this show will bring together the largest collection of his portable artworks ever assembled. Fra Angelico's enduring artistic influence well into the second half of the Fifteenth Century was publicly acknowledged by Pope John Paul II. The pontiff beatified Fra Angelico and recognized him as the patron of artists in 1984.
Finally, The Met's second-floor European Paintings Galleries will be the temporary home of three masterpieces that comprise Antonello da Messina: Sicily's Renaissance Master from December 13, 2005 to February 28, 2006. Antonello da Messina (ca. 1430-1479) trained as a painter in Naples. He excelled in oil painting which he might have learned from the Netherlandish artist Petrus Christus (ca. 1410-1475/76) in 1456 in Milan. The artist traveled to Venice in 1475, where he influenced Giovanni Bellini (1432?-1516) and other Venetian painters. One of the three extraordinary paintings that will be on display at The Met will be Antonello's Virgin of the Annunciation, whose alluring beauty and penetrating gaze perhaps anticipate the enigmatic nature of Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519).
Fall into Winter this year will prove to be a fascinating time at three East Coast museums. The artistic magnificence of the Italian and Northern Renaissances is sure to attract numerous museumgoers throughout the two seasons.
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From your Guide: Stan Parchin, Senior Correspondent for Museums / Special Exhibitions, is a specialist in ancient, late-medieval and Renaissance art and history. His interests include: the art and culture of Old and New Kingdom Egypt; the Italian and Northern Renaissances; Church history; and witchcraft, heresy and social dissent in late-medieval and early Modern Europe.
See all Special Exhibition and Catalogue Reviews from Stan Parchin.
