780 guests will arrive from all over the world for the exclusive Gala dinner on September 26th at Palazzo Corsini, whose “direction” is entrusted to Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura. The dinner scheduled for September 27th, which will be held in the Hall of the Five Hundred in Palazzo Vecchio for the charity event in favor of the Andrea Bocelli Foundation. A unique evening for those who wish to attend Maestro Bocelli's singing performance and participate in the charity auction in support of the Foundation's national and international projects.
The galleries present and the works exhibited
Most of the galleries that will exhibit at Biaf, of which Fabrizio Moretti is president, have on average 30 to 50 years of experience such as Sarti, Tornabuoni, Lampronti, Piva, Sperone & Westwater, Dickinson whose founder Simon Dickinson in the past discovered works by Botticelli, Titian and Rubens, among many others. Galleries recently founded or directed by young gallery owners are no exception to these high standards, who will bring new discoveries and rarities to Palazzo Corsini. Caretto & Occhinegro and Romano Fine Arts return to Florence and Flavio Gianassi, based in London, will be entering for the first time, exhibiting a careful selection of Italian paintings and sculptures from the XNUMXth to the XNUMXth century, including a large painted cross by Giovanni da Rimini and three small tondi by Bicci di Lorenzo. Two other very prestigious foreign galleries will also be participating for the first time: Lullo Pampoulides (London) and Rob Smeets (Geneva). The Vetting Committee will monitor all of them, whether they deal with ancient or contemporary works. composed of 55 experts from various sectors (paintings, sculptures, ceramics, furnishings, drawings, silverware).
Botticelli Antiquity will propose a head of bishop Andrea de' Mozzi (ca. 1296-1300), attributed to a collaborator of Arnolfo di Cambio, a fragment of the funerary monument preserved in the now destroyed church of San Gregorio della Pace, now incorporated into the Bardini Museum. This work, in addition to having been part of the Bardini collection for decades, depicts an important figure for the artistic development of thirteenth-century Florence. Bishop Andrea de' Mozzi signed the contract with Arnolfo di Cambio for the façade of the Cathedral and promoted the construction of Santa Croce and the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova.
Maurizio Canesso, which celebrates 30 years of activity, offers the Italian market a Madonna and Child by Bronzino (1525-1526), a panel by one of the major protagonists of Florentine painting, a very rare author and always loved by great collectors. The panel is an extraordinary testimony to a crucial moment in Bronzino's career: Pontormo's lesson is still vivid but we can already glimpse the characteristics of the crystalline and pure painting so typical of the painter's maturity. Among the protagonists of Carlo Orsi's stand there will be a Madonna with Child and Saint Mary Magdalene by Tiziano Vecellio (cover image). This oil on canvas, datable between 1555 and 1560, has been recognized as an authentic masterpiece by the Venetian master by illustrious art experts, including Federico Zeri. The mastery of the execution and the excellent state of conservation make it qualitatively superior even to the versions with the same subject preserved in some of the most prestigious museums in the world (Capodimonte Museum, Uffizi Gallery, Hermitage in St. Petersburg). Altomani & Sons reports a recent discovery: a Portrait of the Grand Duchess Vittoria Della Rovere, painted by the Marche artist Camilla Guerrieri (Fossombrone, 1628 – Pesaro, 1690). This masterpiece, within its original frame, celebrates early female emancipation, uniting a female portrait, a female artist and a prominent patron.
The Caretto & Occhinegro Gallery will present a rare “Night Landscape with Stories of Ceres” by Jan Brueghel I, known as the Velvets. The artist spent a fundamental period of travel and study in the Peninsula, from Milan to Rome, where his fame made him one of the most celebrated Flemish painters. In the work the figures are the protagonists of a classical myth centered on Ceres and are created by the important painter Frans Francken II, while the landscape is by Brueghel.
Colnaghi has chosen a work by the artist Giovanna Garzoni (Ascoli Piceno, 1600 – Rome, 1670) Still Life with Flowers in a Glass Vase, circa 1640-1650 (tempera on parchment with traces of black pencil). The beautiful miniature, originally mounted on a copper plate, recently restored is in excellent condition. Giovanna Garzoni can probably be considered the greatest miniaturist of the XNUMXth century in Italy. Born in the Marche to a family of Venetian artists and craftsmen, she trained in Venice with Palma Il Giovane and Tiberio Tinelli, who became her husband. From Orsini Art and Books, a unique work of its kind, on parchment, considered the noble ancestor of paper, closely linked to the history of the family that owns the splendid residence that has hosted the Biennale since 1997, represents the most curious and unusual element of the stand. It is a pair of miniatures by the Venetian artist Antonio David depicting the portraits of Pope Clement XII (Lorenzo Corsini, 1652-1740) and his nephew Cardinal Neri Maria Corsini (1685-1770), both made on a large sheet of parchment finely and densely carved. The proposals of the Alessandra di Castro Gallery: a very rare set of eight gilded bronze candlesticks - shiny and opaque - with an ingenious design and shapes, made in the early eighteenth century, and a canvas from Volterrano which, masterfully painted with a compendium technique, exploits all the expressive potential of non -ended up evoking the figure of Omphale, heroine of the myth who managed to subdue Hercules by making him a slave.
From Robilant+Voena, an exceptional work: a majestic painting by Andrea Appiani, the Portrait of Achille Fontanelli (1813). This painting is probably the artist's last portrait masterpiece, since in April of the same year Appiani suffered a stroke that left him unable to paint for the last years of his life. The subject, Achille Fontanelli (1775-1838), was a military commander of Napoleon's forces in Italy and in 1802 was Napoleon's aide-de-camp. The Tettamanti Gallery will bring, by Eliseo Sala, a Portrait of Rustem Bey, Giovanni Timoteo Calosso, oil on canvas, from 1854. Known as Rustem Bey, a title he received during his service to the Sublime Porte under the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire Mahmud II (1785-1839), Calosso is celebrated for being the author of the “Mémoires d'un vieux soldat”, considered among the most reliable and authoritative testimonies on the Napoleonic campaigns in Europe. From Fine Arts Society a work by Vittorio Corcos from 1900 will be highlighted, it is a fascinating portrait of Anna Belimbau, wife of his friend Adolfo Belimbau. At the center of an extremely scenographic interior, identifiable in one of the rooms of their Florentine home, we can see her slender figure, wrapped in an elegant frock coat. The wax and plaster bust of Antiochus by Medardo Rosso, which can be admired at the Gomiero Gallery, also dates back to 1900. Antonacci Lapiccirella focus on a divisionist pastel by Umberto Boccioni (Portrait of a Young Man, circa 1905).
This rare divisionist pastel is a window into the artist's pre-futurist period, a dive into the creative mind of Boccioni, a young, budding genius who was about to revolutionize the art world with his innovative spirit. The Richard Saltoun Gallery presents itself for the first time at BIAF and will do so with a stand dedicated to three Italian artists: the innovative minimalist Bice Lazzari (1900-1981), the pioneering ceramist Franca Maranò (1920-2015) and the renowned sculptor and painter Antonietta Raphaël (1895-1975). All three artists played a decisive role in the formation of post-war Italian art and, in recent years, have been the protagonists of important institutional solo exhibitions.
Works by Le Corbusier are also announced for the twentieth century by Tornabuoni Art, Alberto Savinio from Sperone Westwater with a “Nocturne” from 1950, a De Chirico from 1933 from Farsetti entitled The Daughters of Minos (Ancient Scene in Pink and Blue II).
On the cover, detail of a painting by Tiziano Vecellio and his workshop, Madonna and Child with Saint Mary Magdalene. Oil on canvas, 104 x 92,5 cm – Galleria Carlo Orsi
Alongside Biaf for the 2024 edition, as main sponsor, there is also Gucci.
