Room 6
Grouped together here are three moving
meditations by Antonello and Giovanni Bellini
on the theme of the Crucifixion. Emotionally
charged because of their small size and the
fact that they were for private use, they reflect
the highly eloquent dialogue between the two
great masters from 1475 to 1476, when
Antonello was in Venice. The quality of
Bellini’s paintings is astounding, almost
miraculous, heightening the dramatic
sufferings of Christ in the minutely observed,
authentic details of the landscape rendered
with realism and wonderfully rich colour and
light. All the details should be studied in
depth: from the blood trickling down the Saviour’s body to the meticulous brushwork
that makes the pebbles of the river sparkle, as
in the Crucifixion from Florence, to the
absolute visual precision of the incredible
diversity of the flowers and plants, the join of
the arms of the cross with the different veining
in the wood, and Christ’s contracted fingers,
as in the Crucifixion from Prato. Antonello’s
Crucifixion from Antwerp is marked by
sublime nobility and crystalline control. It is
signed and dated 1475, and shows all the
painter’s inventive genius in the sweeping view
behind Golgotha, constructed not according to
the canons of the time, but with at least two
vanishing points. It also reveals a profound
knowledge of anatomy in the contorted and
foreshortened figures of the two thieves
crucified with Christ.
