At Florence's Galleria dell'Accademia an afternoon of study devoted to Perugino

The Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence is participating in the official celebrations for the five hundredth anniversary of the death of Pietro Vannucci, known as Perugino (Città della Pieve, c. 1450 - Fontignano, 1523), whose Vallombrosa Altarpiece, dated 1500 and commissioned to the Umbrian painter by the Vallombrosian abbot-general Don Biagio Milanesi (1444-1523) for the Abbey’s high altar, is being preserved.

In fact, onMonday, March 13, from 5 to 6:30 p.m., there will be an afternoon of study with talks by Marco Pierini, director of the National Gallery of Umbria, and Professor Francesco Salvestrini, professor of Medieval History at the University of Florence. Free admission subject to availability.

Marco Pierini, curator of the exhibition The Best Master of Italy. Perugino nel suo tempo (opened last March 4 at the National Gallery of Umbria in Perugia and open until June 11, 2023), will talk about the artist, among the greatest of the Italian Renaissance, and his activity at the time of the making of the Vallombrosa altarpiece. Francesco Salvestrini, on the other hand, will discuss the historical figure of Biagio Milanesi, a leading figure in the political and cultural life of the 15th century, who is remembered as a refined patron of the arts and patron of Perugino.

For the occasion, the Sala del Colosso will be opened extraordinarily to allow visitors to admire the Vallombrosa Altarpiece on display here. The work was created between 1497 and 1500, and is one of the most representative examples of the painter’s Florentine period. It depicts in the center the Assumption of the Virgin with at her feet Saints Bernard degli Uberti, a Vallombrosian monk and cardinal; Giovanni Gualberto, founder of the Vallombrosa monastery; Benedict, inspirer of the Rule; and Michael, patron of the nearby abbey of Passignano. Stolen by Napoleon Bonaparte and transported to France after the suppression of the monastery (1810), upon its return to Italy in 1817 it was placed in the Accademia Gallery. At the base of the painting are the only two surviving compartments of the predella, where the portraits of Don Biagio Milanesi, commissioner of the painting, and the monk Baldassare di Angelo, a leading figure of the order, appear. The two compartments are recognized as undisputed masterpieces of portraiture of the time.

Image: Pietro Perugino, Assumption of the Madonna and Saints, detail

At Florence's Galleria dell'Accademia an afternoon of study devoted to Perugino

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