Botticelli displayed in Chambord

Botticelli displayed in Chambord

Bringing two paintings together reflects the influences of Italian artists in the Loire Valley.

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Thu 31 Oct 2024 4:31 PM

An unexpected treasure in the church of Saint Félix in Champigny-en-Beauce, France, the Virgin Mary, Infant Christ, and the Young St. John the Baptist, initially dated as being nineteenth century, has recently been authenticated as an original sixteenth-century piece from the studio of Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510). It will be presented in the chapel at Chambord until January 19, 2025 alongside its model conserved in the Palazzo Pitti, exceptionally on loan from the Uffizi Gallery.

Botticelli at Chambord ph. Leonard de Serres
Botticelli at Chambord ph. Leonard de Serres

Botticelli’s original painting, displayed in the Palatine Gallery at the Uffizi in Florence, seems to have been made 15 years before the one conserved in the church of Saint Félix at Champigny-en-Beauce, in the Loir-et-Cher department. This work long went unnoticed as it was thought to be a nineteenth-century copy. Curator Matteo Gianeselli was the first to draw attention to the painting at Champigny-en-Beauce during his research into Italian paintings conserved in French public collections. He identified the piece as an original sixteenth century work made in Botticelli’s studio in Florence.

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Restoration work was coordinated by the DRAC Centre-Val de Loire and carried out in workshops at the Centre de Recherche et de Restauration des Musées de France (C2RMF). In 2021-22, the Musée Jacquemart-André presented the work in an exhibition titled Botticelli Artist and Designer, alongside the prototype from Florence. Matteo Gianeselli’s intuition was confirmed both by critical examination from art historians and scientific analyses made by the C2RMF under director Dominique Martos-Levif.

Botticelli at Chambord ph. Leonard de Serres

Another version of the Virgin Mary, Infant Christ, and St. John the Baptist was made in the Botticelli studio around 1500. It now belongs to the Barber Institute of Fine Arts in Birmingham, UK.

Similar but different, the two paintings displayed in the chapel of the château at Chambord demonstrate developments in painting technique as well as the functioning of Botticelli’s studio and the extent to which artists in Florence created multiple representations of the Holy Family. The painting from Champigny is very close to the one in Florence, though the composition is reversed, no doubt on account of the duplication technique used, and shows background variation (outside with rose bush, inside with shadow).

Bringing these two paintings together reflects the influences of Italian artists in the Loire Valley, including Leonardo da Vinci, whose work inspired the architecture at Chambord and its famous double-helix stairway.

Botticelli: Two Madonnas at Chambord

Château de Chambord, Chambord, France

October 20, 2024 – January 19, 2025

www.chambord.org

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