Beijing's Renaissance
- Source: Global Times
- [17:38 March 29 2011]
- Comments
Botticelli's Adoration of the Magi, painted between 1500 and 1510
By Wu Ziru
Are you the kind of art lover who has long been enchanted with Italian Renaissance painting, but never had the money or opportunity to visit any of the European museums that specialize in them?
Then you should not miss your chance here in Beijing: an exhibition currently on show at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) Art Museum will, as the organizers says, take you traveling through the (almost) complete history of Italian Renaissance art.
Scheduled to run until June 5, the exhibition, with 82 paintings ranging from the 15th to mid-20th century on show, has attracted enthusiastic audiences since it opened March 12, after previously touring the Shanghai Museum, Hubei Provincial Museum and Hunan Provincial Museum last year, attracting huge attention at each stop.
Entitled "From the Collections of the Uffizi Gallery," the exhibition is curated by Antonio Natali, director of the gallery, presenting three genres: landscapes, still life and portrait paintings.
Just as the title says, all works on show come from a selected collection of the world-renowned Uffizi Gallery, which was built in 1581 in Florence, an age almost as old as the Renaissance itself.
Widely acclaimed as one of the three best art museums in the world, the Uffizi Gallery is justly famous for its incomparable collection of Italian Renaissance paintings. Without visiting the gallery personally they say there is no chance for you to call yourself a professional Renaissance man.
"We hope more Chinese people can understand Italian art and culture through the exhibition," said Natali, adding that he sees the works as a form of "painted poems," which he thought would have particular resonance with Chinese audiences.
