ANTONELLO DA MESSINA This volume has been published in conjunction with the exhibition "Antonello da Messina: Sicily's Renaissance Master" held at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, December 13, 2005-March 5, 2006 The exhibition was organized and made possible by the Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian Region, Hon. Alessandro Pagano, and the Foundation for Italian Art and Culture, with the generous support of Bulgari and ACP Group. Additional support has been provided by the Gail and Parker Gilbert Fund and the Italian Cultural Institute of New York. This exhibition catalogue is made possible by the Drue E. Heinz Fund. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Copyright © 2005 by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York John P. O'Neill, Editor in Chief Gwen Roginsky, Associate General Manager of Publications Ellen Shultz, Editor Bruce Campbell, Designer Margaret Rennolds Chace, Managing Editor Peter Antony, Chief Production Manager Sally Van Devanter, Production Manager Robert Weisberg, Assistant Managing Editor Jean Wagner, Bibliographer The essay and three entries by Gioacchino Barbera translated from the Italian by Lawrence Jenkens Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Barbera, Gioacchino. Antonello da Messina : Sicily's Renaissance master / Gioacchino Barbera, with contributions by Keith Christiansen and Andrea Bayer. p. em. Catalog of an exhibition to be held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Dec. 13, 2005-Mar. 5, 2oo6. Includes bibliographical references. ISBJS I-)8839-177-9 (pbk.) --ISBN o-3oo-n648-9 (Yale University Press) 1. Antonello, da Messina, 1430?-!479-Exhibitions. I. Antonello, da Messina, 143o?-r479· II. Christiansen, Keith. III. Bayer, Andrea. IV. Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y) V. Title. ND623.A53952A4 2oos 759.5-dcn Cover: Thr J;lrgin Annunciatte (cat. 6) Frontispiece: Portrait of a Man (cat. 5) Printed and bound in Italy Contents Statement by the Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian Region 7 Letter from the Chairman) Foundation for Italian Art and Culture 9 Director)s Foreword ro THE EXALTED ART OF ANTONELLO DA MESSINA (about 1430-1479) KEITH CHRISTIANSEN 13 THE LIFE AND WORK OF ANTONELLO DA MESSINA GIOACCHINO BARBERA 17 THE EXHIBITION GIOACCHINO BARBERA, ANDREA BAYER 31 Checklist of Other Exhibited Works 50 Biographical Note 51 Participating Museums in Sicily 53 Selected Bibliography 54 Photograph Credits 56 Statement by the Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian Region a modern citizen of Sicily I take pride in pre­ modulated light that lends substance to the forms and senting these works by Antonello da Messina, defines their planes. Aone of the greatest Sicilians and one of the Antonello's portraits are extraordinary (especially foremost artists of all time. He was born in a town on in comparison to the prevailing contemporary profile the periphery of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies at portraits) for their inventiveness and for their almost the end of the Middle Ages, and yet he attained a "photographic" realism, underscored by the subtle place for himself on the larger stage of international positioning of the sitter in space. The lesson we glean culture; indeed, he reached its apogee, and became a from Antonello's portrait studies, so often evocative source of inspiration for other artists. In describing although their subjects remain anonymous, like the his San Cassiano altarpiece (fig. 3), the erudite human­ one long referred to as the "Unknown Sailor" (cat. 3) ist Matteo Colazio, writing from Venice, named in Cefalu, is of the terrible disadvantage that the loss "Antonellum siculum" ( Antonello of Sicily) as the of identity poses. We no longer can attach a name to one painter alive capable of imitating the perfection the sitter and, worse still, cannot even speculate about of the art of antiquity. He was praised in the same whom and what he might have been. This is emblem­ humanist circles for his ability to create figures "so atic, too, of the urgent cultural problems we cur­ well that they seemed alive and missing only a soul" rently face as a result of the homogenizing process of (Marin Sanudo) since he "made inanimate things seem globalization. Antonello's work points to the impor­ real and animate creatures seem alive" (F. Maurolico ). tance of recovering traditions and the fundamental Antonello was an outstanding artist, whose works values underlying them as a basis for our own future. embodied the great cultural traditions of Renaissance Thus, we have allocated government resources at the Europe. His paintings, executed in Sicily, Naples, ministry of Beni Culturali in Sicily toward further­ and Venice, combine a Netherlandish interest in ing the concept of "Identity and the Future;' even minute descriptive detail, a Provens:al tendency when the work in question belongs to the "Patrimony toward stylization of the figure, the emotional timber of Humanity." of Giovanni Bellini's Venetian colorism, and Piero Antonello's art reflects most authentically and in della Francesca's synthesis of spatial representation the deepest sense that "being Sicilian" means being a and perspective. These are the principal cultural citizen of the world. The atmosphere in his paintings, threads woven together in the art of the age of human­ whether portraits or images of saints or of the ism and the Renaissance. Antonello possessed an Madonna, always invokes Sicily. As the author extraordinary ability to synthesize and simplify figures Leonardo Sciascia, another great Sicilian, defined it, and objects into pure geometry, and they are brought "man['s J life and his vision of his life are irrevocably to life by the quality of the light that caresses their conditioned by the places and the people among surfaces, giving them clarity and depth, and, in the whom ... [he J is born and is raised and reaches adult­ case of the sitters, psychological presence. In his hood." Also Sicilian, metaphorically, was Antonello's paintings, it is the color in addition to the carefully ability to achieve success even though he began life at 7 a disadvantage. Like all southerners, Antonello was The Virgin Annunciate confronts us with the gentle also an "emigrant"; in the course of his travels he but startled gesture of an educated young woman who would learn a great deal while also disseminating his has been surprised by the appearance of an unex­ style throughout Europe. Today, his work can be pected visitor, bearing a curious message, having found in the most important art museums worldwide. arrived suddenly with the lightness of a breath of A poignant feature of Antonello's images of the wind and the brilliance of a ray of sunshine. The Madonna, beginning with the Virgin Annunciate (cat. 6) reservation visible in her pose and in the solemn ges­ in the Palazzo Abatellis, is that they convey the inno­ ture of her small hand betrays the intimacy of her cence and purity of Southern Italian women-a natu­ silent acknowledgment of the mysterious news she has ral beauty that we call "acqua e sapone" (soap and water). just received. The contents of the message are trans­ The outdoor settings of his paintings of the Crucifixion lated in profoundly human terms and we comprehend capture the vastness of the Sicilian countryside and its significance personally. The story of the Virgin is the distant Straits of Messina; these are actual land­ thus told without words, her acceptance of her fate scapes still recognizable today, and the spirit of the hidden behind her glance, but the eyes of the angel figures that inhabit them will never be diminished. tell all. Alessandro Pagano Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian Region 8 Letter from the Chairman) Foundation for Italian Art and Culture t is impossible to think of Antonello da Messina's cultural excellence. Civilizations-Phoenician, Greek, unique artistry and virtuosity without considering Byzantine, Arab, Norman-met in Sicily and each left I the city and island of his birth. He was, in many a rich legacy. When traveling through Sicily and view­ respects, the paradigmatic figure of Sicilian culture: ing its artistic landmarks one is exposed to a synopsis someone who profited from the island's strategic posi­ of the art history of the West. tion in the Mediterranean and its vast commercial ties It is for this reason that the Foundation for Italian with Northern as well as Southern Europe-with the Art and Culture is particularly proud to bring to the Netherlands as well as with France, Spain, and the United States and its foremost museum three major Italian peninsula. Whether Antonello actually jour­ works by Antonello da Messina, Sicily's Renaissance neyed to the Netherlands or Southern France for his master. These works are seen here for the very first training has long been debated. He certainly spent time on the American continent. A larger exhibition time in Naples and by 1475 had arrived in Venice, of this artist's work, comprising loans from around where his presence was to transform the artistic land­ the world, will open in Rome in the spring of 2oo6. scape. In the truest sense he was an international figure, However, Antonello's extant works are not many, and and the style he created may be seen as European-a those conserved on his native island are among the best. highly personal synthesis of the greatest achievements My thanks go to the Honorable Alessandro Pagano, of the Renaissance north and south of the Alps. In the enthusiastic Cultural Commissioner for the Sicilian his art the descriptive world of Jan van Eyck and Region, and to the Director of the Metropolitan Petrus Christus meets the elevated, perspectival vision Museum, Philippe de Montebello.