The Renaissance masterpiece has recently made it possible to unveil one of the most fascinating mysteries in the history of art: a unique story of secret love between Pope Alexander VI Borgia and the beautiful Giulia Farnese.
Presented with the help of a rich graphic and narrative kit, the exciting story of this unprecedented fresco first dismembered, then lost and finally fortuitously rediscovered, is told to visitors through an evocative setting, where a path of successive rooms will accompany the visitor to the discovery of the work itself.
Coming from a fresco in the Vatican rooms, now disappeared, and depicting the Madonna and Child with Pope Alexander VI Borgia kneeling in adoration, the heart of the entire composition - the blessing Child Jesus - is returned to the public after more than five centuries thanks to the acquisition by the Margaritelli Group, which then entrusted it to the Guglielmo Giordano Foundation to promote its study and dissemination.
Surviving the damnatio memoriae decreed by the successors of the controversial Pope Borgia, the extraordinary painting is the subject of one of the most controversial passages by Giorgio Vasari. The Florentine historian, in the second edition of Lives, narrating of Pinturicchio, he reports in fact that these portrayed above the door of a room the Signora Giulia Farnese for the face of a Madonna, and in the same picture the head of Pope Alexander who adores her.
Due to its singular content, the statement was for centuries considered improbable. Today we know instead that it was true.
With the company Child Jesus of the Hands the spotlight is turned on the figure of Bernardino di Betto, whose fervent activity was at the service of no less than five Popes. Very original painter, master of a composite figurative language, which he blends in a personal synthesis, Flemish microscopy and late-Gothic elegance, Renaissance geometries and highly innovative landscapes. Special guest of a Museum whose history goes hand in hand with that of the Etruscan Academy whose natural vocation is that of the diffusion of historical and artistic culture.
The Guglielmo Giordano Foundation, created in Perugia in 2000, is named in memory of Guglielmo Giordano and was born with the precise intention of carrying out its action in the same areas where the scientific research and cultural interests of the famous Italian technologist were carried out. The Foundation therefore promotes studies and research of a historical and technological nature around wood and likewise interacts with the world of art through the proposition of seminars, conferences, major exhibition events and publications on the most significant artistic expressions of the past and of the contemporary. The research program on the subject of wood takes place within three main fields of study: an environmental field, concerning wood understood as a raw material, but above all as a forest resource to be protected in relation to the environment, the territory and the landscape ; a scientific and technological address concerning the study of wooden structures, particularly in architecture; an artistic address dedicated to the use of wood in the figurative arts – from pictorial supports to statuary, from lutherie to cabinet making – and in design. Since 2004, through the organization of exhibitions and events around the world, the Foundation has promoted awareness of the painting "Bambin Gesù delle Mani" by Pinturicchio, which comes from a fresco in the Vatican rooms that has now disappeared. The most precious part of the entire composition – the Blessing Child Jesus – returned to Umbria after more than five centuries, was acquired by the Margaritelli group and entrusted to the Guglielmo Giordano Foundation for its study and dissemination.
