Perugino's 'Sposalizio della Vergine' Returns to Perugia After Two Centuries

Perugino's altarpiece 'Sposalizio della Vergine' (1501-1504) returns to Perugia after over 200 years for the exhibition 'Il meglio maestro d'Italia. Perugino nel suo tempo' at the Galleria Nazionale dell'Umbria, opening March 2023. The work was confiscated under the Treaty of Tolentino (1797) and transported to France on an ox-drawn cart, arriving in Paris in 1801. It was later moved to Caen, where it has been housed at the Musée des Beaux-Arts since 1970. The exhibition marks the fifth centenary of Perugino's death, featuring about seventy works from before 1504. Major loans include the Louvre's 'La lotta tra Amore e Castità' (1503), the National Gallery of Washington's 'Trittico Galitzin' (1485), and the Uffizi's three panels. The National Gallery of London lends the central register of the 'Polittico della Certosa di Pavia' (1499), reassembled for the first time. The exhibition title quotes a 1500 letter by Agostino Chigi calling Perugino 'il meglio maestro d'Italia'.