"Botticelli and the Search for the Divine". The great 400-500 Florentine painting lands in
From 11 February to 7 April 2017, the Muscarelle Museum of Art, Williamsburg, Virginia, will host an exhibition of great international concern: "Botticelli and the Search for the Divine: Florentine Painting Between the Medici and the Bonfires of the Vanities". The great painter of the Italian Renaissance, Sandro Botticelli, will be celebrated with an exhibition that includes, among others, one of the two existing Venuses. This painting, normally exposed in the Sabauda Gallery in Turin, will be on display for the first time in the USA. "I am amazed by the magnificence of these paintings" said the Ambassador of Italy in the United States, Armando Varricchio, "many of which are on display for the first time in this prestigious museum, that I would like to thank for its excellent collaboration with the Italian Embassy". Botticelli (Florence, 1445-1510) was a prolific painter and his characters are mostly life-size. The sixteen paintings, coming from Italian churches and museums such as the Uffizi Gallery, the Pitti Palace, the Gallery of the Academy, the National Museum of Bargello and the St. Mark's Museum in Florence; the Poldi Pezzoli Museum in Milan; the Cini Foundation in Venice; the Cathedral Museum in Prato and the Civic Museum in San Gimignano, represent every phase of the Master's career, making it the greatest Botticelli exhibition ever hosted in the USA. It was organized in collaboration with the Metamorfosi Cultural Association. The exhibition also includes six rare paintings by Botticelli's teacher, Filippo Lippi; a few paintings by Filippino Lippi, Filippo's son and Botticelli's student; a painting and a bronze statuette by Antonio Pallaiuolo and, lastly, two paintings by Fra Bartolomeo.