Description

The work commissioned to Silvia Salvadori provided a first accurate study of the face and a restoration of the original incarnate and gold headgear, in the original in a bad state of conservation. Much attention has also been paid to the delicate and precious floral embroidery that is present within the agate and very abrasive in the original tablet.  Silvia Salvadori has reshaped every single detail of the decorations to perfection. The Incarnate of the Virgin has returned to shine out of its natural light. In this study of the face of the Virgin of Masaccio, Silvia Salvadori, wanted to imagine how the original work could appear before the old restorations and the erroneous cleaning done in the past. History: Virgin Mary Casini (Virgin Mary and Child), also known as Virgin Mary del Solletico, by Masaccio, is a tempera on a table of very small size (24,50x18,20 cm), kept at the Uffizi of Florence and dated from 1426 to 1427. The small table must have been almost certainly a painting for the private devotion of the cardinal of Sienese origin, jurist and canonist Antonio Casini, whose coat of arms is painted on the back of the table (gold, black band loaded with a cross of red, and accompanied by six stars of eight blue tips, ordered in the cradle).  The presence of the cardinal hat on the coat of arms led to a concomitant date, or in any case after his nomination, on May 26, 1426. The Cardinal, an educated and refined character, Branda Castiglione's friend (commissioner of Masolino and perhaps of Masaccio himself) in contact with various humanists and is likely to have chosen the Florentine painter after Masolino's departure for Hungary. The ancient stories of the work are unknown. It was discovered in 1947 by Rodolfo Siviero who brought it back to Italy among the masterpieces of the Germans during the Second World War. Exhibited in the Loeser collection at Palazzo Vecchio was again stolen in 1971 and again found by Siviero two years later. Since 1988 has been in the Uffizi. The first to attribute the work to Masaccio was Roberto Longhi in 1950.