The vice-president of the Chamber of Deputies, Giorgio Mulè, and the undersecretary of the Ministry of Culture, Giampiero Cannella, met in Madrid with the director of the Prado museum in Madrid Miguel Falomir Faus. At the center of the conversation which saw the participation of Elena Fontanella, director of the Italian Cultural Institute of Madrid, was the project of obtaining availability for the transfer from the Prado of a masterpiece by Antonello da Messina: the «Christ in mercy and an angel» also known as «the Pietà of Antonello».
The director of the Prado warmly welcomed the proposal of the loan of the Pietà which is part of the path shared with the Minister of Culture, Alessandro Giuli, who just yesterday gave his willingness, at the invitation of the vice president Mulè, to allow the arrival in Palermo of the Ecce homo by Antonello di Messina currently exhibited at the L’Aquila museum after having been purchased at auction by the Italian State.
The cultural “Renaissance” of Sicily
“This is extraordinary news for Sicily”, say Giorgio Mulè and Giampiero Cannella in a joint statement, “which coincides with the celebration of the 600th anniversary of Antonello’s birth. Thanks to the sensitivity of the minister, Giuli will soon arrive at Palazzo Abatellis in the presence of Antonello’s Annunciata l’Ecce homo.
Today, with the Prado’s availability of the Pietà loan, a step is added towards the realization of Sicily’s cultural and development dream. All this is part of a season of renaissance on the island which finds a central point in culture.”