“We are delighted to celebrate this occasion with new initiatives that are highly representative of our identity,” declares Nadia Righi, director of the Diocesan Museum. Titian’s Annunciation, the masterpiece for Milan 2021 on loan from the Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte in Naples, the great Orticanoodles mural, and Francesco Londonio’s Nativity Scene: these are some of the most important initiatives that the Carlo Maria Martini Diocesan Museum has organised to celebrate its 20th anniversary. From 6 November 2021 to 6 February 2022, the museum halls will welcome the outstanding work by Titian, commissioned by the merchant Antonio Cornovì and executed around 1558, a painting of the artist’s maturity where the narrative of the scene is expressed through colour intensity.

The Venetian master places the Virgin almost hidden in a corner with the angel in the foreground introducing viewers to the dialogue between the two. The true subject of the painting however is the Holy Spirit, that occupies half of the pictorial field. Shimmering and explosive is the extraordinary luminist effect with which Titian describes God’s presence.

Thanks to the much-awaited “Un Capolavoro per Milano” event, Gothic Lombardy will welcome this precious and rare example of Venetian painting executed in 16th-century Naples.

Old masters meet contemporary art, in this case in the form of street art, establishing a dialogue between the Diocesan museum and its district in a participative art project involving students. Also of note is the presentation of an important acquisition, Londonio’s Nativity Scene. “These occasions are to be understood as a reflection on Hope, which we all need to restart,” concludes director Righi.

Opening image: Orticanoodles, Icons