Fondazione Ragghianti: events autumn 2014

The Fondazione Centro Studi sull’Arte Licia e Carlo Ludovico Ragghiati has tracked the guidelines to be followed and has launched the following plan of initiatives for the autumn 2014.

• On Friday September 26 at 5.30 pm, Alessandro Cecchi, curator of the exhibition “Jacopo Ligozzi. Pittore universalissimo” (Galleria Palatina in Florence till Sept. 28^th), will hold the lecture ‘Jacopo Ligozzi, an unknown protagonist of the art in Florence between Mannerism and Counter-Reformation at the conference hall in San Micheletto.

Jacopo Ligozzi less-known but sophisticated artist, born in Verona but painter at the Medici’s court between ‘500 and ‘600, also worked in Lucca showing the sensitivity and the tastefulness of the commission of Lucca during that time

Ligozzi left to the town some interesting religious artworks: in the Oratory of the Name of Jesus in the Chiesa della Rosa, demolished during the Napoleonic Era, he made the frescoes of three canvases, which illustrated the complete range of the expressive possibilities of the artist: the Circumcision, now kept in the sacristy of the cathedral, the Adoration of the Name of Jesus, of the Mazzarosa Collection and the Baptism of Christ, exposed at the Museo Nazionale di Villa Guinigi.  The Visitation made for the fourth left altar of the Cathedral. Another work by Ligozzi is kept in Lucca, Jacinth in adoration of the Virgin with the child exhibited in Florence and which is part of the collections of Palazzo Mansi and which was donated to Lucca by Leopold II of Lorena after unification of Lucca to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.

 

• The debate “The cities of art between culture and tourism” scheduled for Friday October 17^th at 5.30 pm will have Vittorio Emiliani as protagonist to discuss the theme of the future of the cities of art divided between the restoration and conservation of their cultural roots and the tourism needs. Journalist for the main Italian newspapers, writer and essayist, Emiliani published on the issue of the July 18^th of L’Unità an open letter to the minister Franceschini about the proposals of strict integration between tourism and cultural and landscape heritage advocated by the new government.

 

• On Saturday November 8^th at 5.30 the volume edited by the Fondazione Ragghianti and titled “Discovered harmony. Medieval art in Lucca” will be presented. This ideally represents the closure of the celebrations, started in 2010, of the centenary of the birth of Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti, anniversary that has underlined his studies, not so well known but very original, about the Middle Ages. After the publication of “Prius ars. Art in Italy between the IV and the X century” dedicated to the Dark Ages, the exhibition and the catalogue “Lucca e l’Europa. Un’idea di Medioevo” , the collection of the essays which will be presented on Nov. 8^th will treat about the Medieval art in Lucca between the beginnings of the XII century to the first decades of the XII century and will be dedicated to the memory of Giovanni Cattani, president of the Fondazione Ragghianti from 1997 to 2011, who devoted himself with passion to the Fondazione and who was the most precious and staunch supporter of the celebrative Ragghiantian initiatives dedicated to the Middle Ages in Lucca.

 

• On Friday November 21^st, with the multimedia and interdisciplinary concert-conference “American Notations” cured by Paolo Bolpagni and Claudio Pestalozza and with the participation of the pianist Antonio Ballista, a new series of initiatives dedicated to the mixture of arts will open. On that date the theme of the changes between different expressive areas with the reference to the visual and “iconic” character of the music sheets of the new avant-gardes of the Usa of the 50ies and 60ies will be dealt according to a new and original view.

• On Friday December 5^th, on the occasion of the anniversary of the birth, a day of study “Licia Collobi Ragghianti art historian” will be dedicated to the woman who not only was the wife but also the most precious collaborator of Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti and a sensitive and appreciated art historian. Both her personal interests, such as the Flemish art in Italy, and her commitment of “Honorary Inspector”, at the Gallery of modern art in Florence during the first years of the 50ties, in which role she elaborated an interesting exhibition proposal, the first after the war, for the enlargement of the Gallery.

Simonella Condemi, director of the Gallery of modern art in Florence, willl put in comparison the hypothesis from the archives of Licia Collobi, with the later realizations and that is in coincidence with the initiatives for the Centenary of the Foundation of the gallery itself.