CURATOR MATTHIAS WIVEL'S INTRODUCTION TO LORENZO LOTTO'S(1480-1556/1557) PORTRAITS

Heavenly Jerusalem

against the Dolomites,

very familiar subject,

but if you look at the Virgin

she looks like a middle-aged woman;

it is the Virgin in Glory,

perhaps the resurrected Virgin

or the Virgin of Immaculate Conception,

born without sin of human parents,

very troubling concept in the Church.

But why is she Middle-Aged?

Because she is a noble woman,

deposed as a queen of Cyprus

by the Venetian government.

She also build a myth around her,

living in celibacy; it

looks presumptuous to us,

but these kind of things happen

in this time. He is

described in a document

'a very major painter',

international, so to speak. It

is a tour-de-force, briefly

mentions the death of his putative master,

the attention he pays to objects,

draperies and books. The

Dead Christ with angels and Mary Magdalene

and Joseph of Arimatia, he is

present in his picture, his

graphic sensibility, the different hues

of skin, the sun-burnt of the male figure

beyond her. Very interestingly

changes, changes quite a lot in

the years to come. He

comes to Rome, ends up working

for the pope Julius II. You

can see how differently it is painted

from Raphael, it is highly controversial

but possible. You can see before

Rome, after Rome. The discipline

has given way to disorder, strangely

unsettled figure, composition -

of course influenced by Raphael. 

He can't go back after seeing what

he has seen, had to leave Rome,

liberates him, takes away

from fifteenth-century to sixteenth century

art. He stays there about

a decade, on the edge

of Venetian dominion. With

a strong local community. This

is an altar-piece for a Church

when Bergamo was
coming back to Venetian rule

after years of French. Lotto

brings his specific weirdness to it.

He was paid a lot of money for it.

06.11.2018