Venice will lend Leonardo's iconic Vitruvian Man (1490)
Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man will go on show after all at the Louvre retrospective devoted to the artist, when it opens on 24 October. The loan from the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice was announced along with several others at a meeting in Paris on Tuesday between the French and Italian culture ministers Franck Reister and Dario Franceschini. The agreement puts an end to a cultural exchange controversy that erupted under Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini's government, which fell earlier this month.
Franceschini had agreed to the loans when he was in previously office in 2017, but far right members of the Salvini government questioned the deal, accusing France of trying to marginalise Italy and monopolise the 500th anniversary of the celebrated artists death.
At their meeting, the two ministers signed an agreement praising cultural cooperation throughout Europe and planning an exchange of loans for the Louvre's exhibition and the Rafael show in the Scuderie del Quirinal in Rome in 2020. The Louvre agreed to lend the portrait of Baldassare Castiglione and Rafaels self portrait with a friend, as well as five drawings, two of them by his assistant Gianfrancesco Penni.
For its part, Italy pledged an impressive series of works for the Leonardo retrospective, including the Vitruvian Man from the Gallerie dell'Accademia, which is normally shown only a few weeks every six years. The duration of the loan to the Louvre has not yet been determined.
Despite resistance from the Uffizi directors, Eike Schmidt, the Italian Minister also decided to loan six works from the Florence museum, including the very first drawing signed and dated by the artist, a view of the Arno river, and the oldest copy of the Battle of Anghiari, the lost frescoRead More – Source
