PERUGINO MASTERPIECE REUNITED IN PERUGIA
2023, the 500th centenary of the death of the great Renaissance painter Pietro Vannucci – better known as Perugino - gives art lovers a unique opportunity to see one of the artist's most amazing masterpieces in its original form and setting. The magnificent centrepiece of the polyptych featuring the Ascension of Christ is at present on show in the Abbey Church of San Pietro in the artist's birth town of Perugia, on loan from the Musée des Beaux-Arts of Lyon in France.
The monumental polyptych, which originally covered the wall behind the main altar, was dismantled during restructuring work on the church at the end of the 16th century. In 1797, at the time of the Napoleonic occupation of Italy, it became part of the war plunder of Italian works of art. Divided into eleven parts, it was taken to France and ended up in the collections of the Fine Arts Museums of Rouen, Nantes and Lyon. Only five small panels from the predella (a raised shelf at the bottom of the polyptych) remained in the church's possession.Subsequent negotiations by Antonio Canova after the fall of Napoleon, achieved the transfer of some other sections to the Vatican Museum.
The Cathedral of San Pietro is one of the most richly decorated religious house in Italy, with the walls of the interior entirely covered with a stunning display of renaissance paintings and grotesques. But these are not the only impressive works of art that this exclusive (and little known) church possesses. Its carved wooden choir, designed by Raphael, is hailed as the most beautiful of its type in Italy. It possesses Italy's oldest organ, dating from 1463, famed for the quality of its acoustics. It also features one of the world's largest paintings: an “Apotheosis of the Benedictine Order” by Antonio Vassilacci, who also decorated much of the Doge's Palace in Venice. This work measures around 90 sqm and occupies the entire wall above the entrance door and features a bewildering mass of over 300 larger-than-life figures.
A registered Italian National Monument, St. Peter's abbey was founded in 965 and built on the ruins of an earlier church that in turn occupied an ancient Etruscan-Roman sacred site. The Cathedral.is tucked in a corner of the former vast monastic complex of the Benedictines, which, with typical Italian quirky nonchalance, has now become part of the local Faculty of Agronomy.
On show until the 7th January 2024.
M. STENHOUSE
Info: Tel. +39.075.33753 www.fondazioneagraria.it
