An exhibit on Italian
painter Lorenzo Lotto (1480-1556/7) ongoing in the Marche region
through February 11, 2019, highlights the strong bond between
the Venice-born Renaissance master and his elective home.
The exhibit, at Macerata's Palazzo Bonaccorsi as well as
eight other sites in the Marche that were close to the painter's
heart, also focuses on the mystery surrounding the disappearance
of one of Lotto's masterworks to raise awareness on the many
artworks that are still missing, curator Enrico Maria Dal
Pozzolo said.
Indeed the show ends with an empty frame of the Madonna with
Child and Three Angels, painted by Lotto in the 1530s, which was
stolen from the municipal palace of Osimo, Ancona, in the night
between November 7-8, 1911, the same year as the famous theft of
the Mona Lisa.
Contrary to Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece, however, Lotto's
painting was never found.
Prior to the theft, between 1900 and 1911, several museums,
including the Uffizi and the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice,
had offered to buy it.
Many had noted that security measures in Osimo were
inadequate for such an important painting.
Its frame was subsequently exhibited at the church of
Santissima Annunziata, first with a black-and-white photo of the
painting, which was replaced in 1999 by a controversial colored
picture.
The exhibit, promoted by the Marche region and the city of
Macerata, includes multimedia support for a closer look on the
great masterpieces on display and critics' opinions.
Another painting on display, a masterwork on San Girolamo,
is controversial.
Bought by the Musei Civici in Bassano del Grappa, the artwork
was believed by a number of art critics, including Vittorio
Sgarbi, not to have been painted by Lotto and was kept in the
museum's deposit for a long time.
In 2018, it was retrieved and examined with scientific
analysis showing it was compatible with Lotto's technique.
Dal Pozzolo has reopened discussion on this masterwork's
paternity with the show, recognizing the high quality of the
painting and its coherence with the painter's artistic phase in
Loreto.
Indeed the curator believes it could be a "free copy" from an
incision by Durer, an artist Lotto loved since his youth, an
element that could prove that the Venetian artist is the painter
behind the masterwork.
Another interesting feature of the show is the Madonna with
Child by Carlo Crivelli, owned by the Museum of Macerata, on
display near Lotto's Madonna, on loan from Venice's Correr
Museum, which was probably painted in the Marche between 1532
and 1534.
It is a silent dialogue between two Venetians who left their
native city to live in the Marche, considered by Lotto as "an
oasis of creative freedom".
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