Antonello da Messina: Sicily's Renaissance Master

Barbera, Gioacchino, with contributions by Keith Christiansen and Andrea Bayer

(2005)
Publication Details
Description

Praised in fifteenth-century humanist circles for his uncanny ability to create

figures "so well that they seemed alive and missing only a soul," the great
Quattrocento master Antonello da Messina was born Antonello di Giovanni d'Antonio
in Messina, a small city on the periphery of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, about
1430. This catalogue accompanies a small, focused exhibition at The Metropolitan
Museum of Art centered around the loan by a trio of Sicilian museums of three
masterpieces by Antonello, which will be seen for the first time in the United
States. The recently rediscovered double-sided painting from Messina of the Madonna
and Child, with a Praying Franciscan Donor, perhaps the artist's earliest extant
work and with a poignant image of Christ Crowned with Thorns on the reverse, is
joined by the Portrait of a Man from Cefalù, a psychological tour de force, and by
the centerpiece of the group—the compelling and mysterious Virgin Annunciate from
Palermo, whose haunting beauty and serenity have been compared to that of
Leonardo's Mona Lisa.

A handful of other works by Antonello—including the Metropolitan Museum's Christ

Crowned with Thorns; a drawing attributed to the artist, in the Metropolitan's
Robert Lehman Collection; and a panel of the Ecce Homo with a scene of Saint Jerome
in the Desert on the reverse side, on loan from a private collection—as well as
four related works by Antonello's contemporaries, from the Museum's own collection,
complete the exhibition. The drawing and each of the paintings are reproduced in
full color, some with fascinating details, and, in addition, several of the
master's key iconic paintings are shown in comparative illustrations.

Although details about Antonello's beginnings are scarce, clouded by legend and
sometimes dubious information in the early sources, his artistic formation appears
to have taken place in Naples, during the reign of Alfonso of Aragon, in a cultural
climate open to French, Provençal, Spanish, and Netherlandish influences. Already
an independent master by 1457, he received numerous local commissions and was the
head of a thriving workshop. A possible first trip to Rome about 1460 may have
afforded Antonello the opportunity to experience the work of Fra Angelico and Piero
della Francesca firsthand. However, the defining moment in his artistic development
was to come later, in 1474–75, when Antonello made his first documented journey to
Venice, a landmark occasion; it was there that he was commissioned to paint the
principal altarpiece, his masterpiece, for the church of San Cassiano. This
innovative work would leave a lasting imprint on the art of Giovanni Bellini and
other Venetian masters, while the portraits Antonello painted in that city
represent a new stage in the evolution of the genre in Italy. No greater artists
would emerge from Southern Italy in the fifteenth century.

The introductory essay by Keith Christiansen illuminates the high points of

Antonello's achievements in the context of his time and his culture; the essay by
Gioacchino Barbera offers a comprehensive study of Antonello's life, family
background, artistic training, travels, expertise as a portraitist, preoccupation
with the theme of the Ecce Homo, late career, and artistic legacy. Entries on the
exhibited works, by Gioacchino Barbera and Andrea Bayer, precede a capsule
biography of the artist, information about the three lending museums in Sicily, a
checklist of the supplementary exhibited works, and a selected bibliography.
Table of contents

Statement by the Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian Region

Letter from the Chairman, Foundation for Italian Art and Culture
Director's Foreword

The Exalted Art of Antonello da Messina (about 1430–1479)

Keith Christiansen

The Life and Work of Antonello da Messina

Gioacchino Barbera

The Exhibition
Gioacchino Barbera, Andrea Bayer

Checklist of Other Exhibited Works

Biographical Note
Participating Museums in Sicily
Selected Bibliography
Photograph Credits