Catalog of an exhibition held at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, February 22-May 20, 2018. Includes bibliographical references (pages 231-244) and index.
Contents:
Acknowledgments -- Acknowledgments -- Fra Angelico's Dormition and Assumption of the Virgin: Transformations Old and New / Gianfranco Pocobene and Alexa Beller. The Provenance of the Four Reliquaries for the Church for Santa Maria Novella / Chiara Pidatella -- Fra Angelico, Giovanni Masi, and the Reliquaries for Santa Maria Novella / Nathaniel Silver -- Fra Angelico and Siena: Contextualizing the Painted Reliquary / Beth Williamson -- Fra Angelico and Santa Maria Novella / Carl Brandon Strehlke -- What Alberti Saw: Fra Angelico, Historia, and Dominican Florence / Nathaniel Silver -- Fra Angelico's Tears: Empathy and the Rhetoric Painting / William Hood -- The History of the Museo di San Marco / Marilena Tamassia -- Fra Angelico's Dormition and Assumption of the Virgin: Transformations Old and New / Gianfranco Pocobene and Alexa Beller.
Summary:
Accompanying the exhibition at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, this catalogue explores one of the most important artists of the Renaissance. Fra Angelico (c. 1395-1455) transformed painting in Florence with pioneering images, rethinking popular compositions and investing traditional Christian subjects with new meaning. His altarpieces and frescoes set new standards for quality and ingenuity, contributing to Angelico's unparalleled fame on the Italian peninsula. With the intellect of a Dominican theologian, the technical facility of Florence's finest craftsmen and the business acumen of its shrewdest merchants, he shaped the future of painting in Italy and beyond. The exhibition reunites for the first time Fra Angelico's four reliquaries for Santa Maria Novella (1424-34; Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and Museo di San Marco, Florence). Together they cover key episodes in the life of the Virgin Mary and capture in miniature some of his most important compositional innovations. Assembled at the Gardner with exceptional examples of Angelico's narrative paintings from collections in Europe and the United States, this exhibition explores his celebrated talents as a storyteller and the artistic contributions that shaped a new ideal of painting in Florence. Exhibition: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, USA, (22.02.-28.05.2018).
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.