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Press release
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Mantegna 1506 – 2006
An artist in three cities
Padua, Musei Civici agli Eremitani
Verona, Gran Guardia
Mantua, Fruttiere di Palazzo Te
16 September 2006 – 14 January 2007
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An extraordinary project that unites three cities in the name of Andrea Mantegna.
The genius of Mantegna, a leading figure in the Italian Renaissance, will be celebrated on the occasion
of the fifth centenary of his death in 1506 with a historic series of exhibitions in three different cities:
Padua, Verona and Mantua.
Three important art cities which together will celebrate the great master, an artist capable of renewing
the artistic language of northern Italy in the mid–sixteenth century; three cities united – for the first time
– in a single, ambitious exhibition project that aims to retrace Mantegna’s career from his early works to
his maturity, presenting his works in the places where he lived and worked and examining his contribution to and influence on the culture of the time.
A total of 350 works, 64 masterpieces by Mantegna, 140 loaning museums, over 56 scholars involved
in the research and consultant committees, an international study conference, all go to create an
unrepeatable event.
Thanks to this initiative, promoted by the National Committee for the Celebration of the 5th centenary of
the death of Andrea Mantegna – set up by the Ministry for the Cultural Heritage and Cultural Activities,
chaired by Vittorio Sgarbi and formed of the leading scholars of the early Italian Renaissance – the master’s greatest works, loaned for the occasion by important cultural institutions and museums around the
world, will return to the cities in which they were created.
The complex project is, in fact, the result of an extraordinary effort in terms of scholarship and organization, made possible by fruitful collaboration between the government and local bodies: as well as the
National Committee, the initiative sees the involvement of the City Councils of Padua, Verona and Mantua,
in collaboration with the Regional Councils of Veneto and Lombardy – Office for the Culture, Identity and
Autonomy of Lombardy, and the support of the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Padova e Rovigo, the
Fondazione Cariverona, the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena and the Fondazione Banca Agricola
Mantovana.
The three exhibitions, each with its own organizing committee, will thus form a fascinating journey in
search of Mantegna’s complex personality, setting out from Padua, the place of his artistic education,
moving on to Verona, the home of one of his most important works, which had such a powerful influence
on the city’s figurative culture, and ending up in Mantua, where the artist spent most of his life up to his
death.
The master’s greatest works will be shown side by side with important works by illustrious artists – contemporaries and followers – the fellow exponents of one of the most crucial seasons in the history of art,
with many works never seen before in Italy, important new interpretations, and outstanding restorations.
In Padua, therefore, invaluable works by Mantegna – such as the fine Madonna with Sleeping Child,
loaned by the Staatliche Museen–Gemäldegalerie of Berlin, St Mark from the Stäedelsches Kunstinstitut
of Frankfurt, and the famous Butler Madonna from the Metropolitan Museum of New York – will be joined
by masterpieces by Donatello, Bellini, Vivarini, Zoppo, Schiavone, Squarcione, Dürer and other famous
artists, including Zoppo’s evocative panel Madonna with Child and Angels, loaned by the Louvre,
Schiavone’s Roberti Polyptych from the National Gallery in London, and the predella of the Gattamelata
Altar by Jacopo Bellini, reassembled for the occasion; it will also be possible to admire a reconstruction
of parts of the frescos of the Cappella Ovetari – Mantegna’s first important commission – with many of
the fragments recovered from the rubble after bombing during the Second World War returned to their
original location.
In Verona, together with two fundamental works produced for the city by Mantegna – the San Zeno Altar
(which will be presented complete with the predella depicting The Crucifixion, housed in France since the
end of the eighteenth century and reunited with the rest of the work only for this occasion), and the famous Madonna in Glory with Saints, known as the Trivulzio Altar, now at the Castello Sforzesco in Milan
– and the entire corpus of the master’s drawings, the exhibition will include works by important figures in
the history of Veronese art, such as Francesco Benaglio’s Madonna and Child from the Memorial Art
Gallery of Rochester and his St Jerome from the National Gallery of Washington, Liberale da Verona’s
Christ Risen, Four Saints and the Bishop Settala, Francesco Bonsignori’s Portrait of a Senator from the
National Gallery of London, and Domenico Morone’s Madonna and Child from Berlin, Fra Giovanni’s
Choir Lectern, as well as Giovanni Bellini’s fine Madonna and Child from the Museum of Castelvecchio.
In Mantua, finally, together with many of the numerous works executed by Mantegna during his long stay
in the city at the Gonzaga court – including The Holy Family with St Elizabeth and St John the Baptist as
a Child from the Kimbell Art Museum of Fort Worth, The Vestal Virgin Tuccia and Sofonisba from the
National Gallery of London, The Judgement of Salomon from the Louvre and the famous Madonna of the
Caves from the Uffizi, the exhibition will include paintings by other artists who worked in the city, like
Lorenzo Leobruno’s Adoration of the Shepherds, loaned by the Art Museum of Worcester and Francesco
Bonsignori’s Blessed Osanna Andreasi.
Choral exhibitions, therefore, which aim to trace the historical, artistic and cultural context that characterized each of the cities in the period in question (1445–1506), beginning with the powerful impact
that Mantegna’s presence had on them.
Among the initiatives that will accompany the exhibitions, the crowning event of the year–long celebration of Mantegna, is the International Conference “Andrea Mantegna. The Mark of Genius”, promoted by
the Provincial Councils of Padua, Verona and Mantua and curated by the Accademia Nazionale Virgiliana.
The conference, to be held over three days in the three cities, will be an opportunity for leading art critics
to discuss the themes considered by the exhibition and to present new interpretations.
There are also numerous collateral events – exhibitions, meetings, concerts, etc. – that each city has
organized in various locations, and the Mantegna itineraries that will allow visitors to explore the historical period in question and to discover important monuments and less well–known works in the three
cities.
The first of the exhibitions is “Mantegna and Padua 1445 – 1460”, held at the Musei Civici agli Eremitani
in Padua and curated by Alberta De Nicolò Salmazo, Davide Banzato and Anna Maria Spiazzi, which retraces the crucial years of the master’s artistic education, and above all the revolutionary period of the
Renaissance, in a city characterized by artistic and cultural ferment, home to important workshops which
would make the city one of the main artistic centres of European Humanism.
The second important exhibition for the further study of Mantegna’s art is “Mantegna and the Arts in
Verona 1450 – 1500”, held at the Gran Guardia in Verona and curated by Mauro Cova, Sergio Marinelli
and Paola Marini, which aims, beginning with the two important commissions executed for the city –
whose history, artistic relevance and conservation will be explored in detail – to outline the rich cultural
mosaic in Verona during the period in which the art of the early Renaissance developed in the city. The
exhibition is also an opportunity to verify the authenticity of the Holy Conversation and Christ Bearing the
Cross from the Museum of Castelvecchio, works not unanimously ascribed to the master.
The excursus into Mantegna’s art is concluded by “Mantegna in Mantua 1460 – 1506”, held in Palazzo Te
and Palazzo San Sebastiano in Mantua and curated by Mauro Lucco, which focusses on the master’s wide
production in the long period in which he lived in the city and worked for the Gonzaga court, and on the
indelible traces he left on painting in Mantua during the “interregnum” between his death and the advent
of Giulio Romano, the other great genius who illuminated the city.
Also in Mantua, in the Castello di San Giorgio at Palazzo Ducale, it will be possible to visit the exhibitions
“Renaissance in the Castello di San Giorgio: Mantegna and the Gonzagas” curated by Filippo Trevisani,
which focusses on the creation of the celebrated Camera Picta, and “Sculpture in the Time of Andrea
Mantegna”, organized by Vittorio Sgarbi, with Giancarlo Gentilini, Rodolfo Signorini and Italo Furlan,
which looks at the relations between Mantegna and antiquity, between Roman classicism and Paduan
naturalism.