New Acquisitions

Museo Nazionale d’Abruzzo – Ex Mattatoio

from 23 September to 1° November 2023

The exhibition is dedicated to the most recent acquisitions: five works that have become part of the Collections of the Museo Nazionale d’Abruzzo, purchased by the Museum between the end of 2022 and 2023.

This selection concerns different types of works ranging from the Middle Ages to the second half of the nineteenth century, temporarily displayed together before being integrated into the permanent exhibition itinerary.

The purchases were motivated by the need to fill certain shortcomings: the works were chosen not only for what they mean for the art in Abruzzo, but for their specific value within the Museum’s Collections.

The stone relief depicting the Madonna Enthroned with Child (known as “Madonna of the jails”), datable to the thirteenth century, represents an important piece in the framework of Abruzzo’s medieval stone production; The Family of Jesus meets the Family of the Baptist (The Holy Kinship), an admirable example of sixteenth-century painting, is a large wooden altarpiece painted by Nicola Filotesio, known as Cola dell’Amatrice (Amatrice 1470 ca. – before 1553), with an unusual iconography; The Madonna del Carmine with Saints Charles Borromeo, Francis of Assisi, Mark the Evangelist, Anthony of Padua and Catherine of Alexandria, a drawing from around the third decade of the seventeenth century by the eclectic painter from L’Aquila Giulio Cesare Bedeschini (L’Aquila, 1582 – 1627), is peculiar in its composition and technique; the work from the second half of the nineteenth century in Abruzzo, The cobbler by Teofilo Patini (Castel di Sangro 1840 –Naples 1906), offers visitors, together with The Redemption purchased in 2022 and already visible in the Museum itinerary, the opportunitỳ to compare two decisive moments in the painter’s artistic production.

On 14 October, the exhibition will be completed with a masterpiece: the large panel by the Master of the Beffi Triptych, the Dormitio Virginis, a high expression of late fourteenth century Abruzzi art. Having been undergoing a conservative restoration for a few months, the panel will be visible in the exhibition in an “open site” dedicated to the latest restoration work.

The exhibit provides an account of the Museum’s research activities over the past year, during which in-depth studies, coupled with targeted acquisition strategies, have led to an expansion of the Collections with particularly significant works of art from the area.