Excellentissimus pictor

On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the death of Pietro di Cristoforo Vannucci, known as il Perugino (c. 1450 - 1523), the Vatican Museums celebrate the great Umbrian master by once again bringing to the attention of the general public, exceptionally in the Pinacoteca Vaticana, a painting usually preserved in the library of the pope at the Apostolic Palace.

It is the Resurrection of Christ, an altarpiece executed in 1499 for the family chapel of the wealthy merchant and landowner Bernardino di Giovanni di Matteo in the church of San Francesco al Prato in Perugia. The artist was then almost fifty and was engaged in numerous commissions, but the perfect organization of his workshop allowed him to maintain an always very high quality in the production. The panel was paid to Perugino 50 florins, including the frame (now lost), a not too high figure, which leads us to hypothesize the involvement of the workshop during the execution. The completion of the work, from the date of the contract (of 1499: the artist is cited as "spectabilis et excellentissimus pictor magister Petrus Christophori de Castro Plebis, civis perusinus"), must have taken place in a short time, perhaps as early as 1500, a circumstance also demonstrated by reflectography which revealed how the painting faithfully follows the underlying drawing and how there are no traces of repentances.

Elements of pure virtuosity appear in the canvas such as the ancient sepulcher taken from the front and with the lid partly open and painted with an extraordinary perspective view, or the Roman soldiers represented in the most disparate poses, some in the act of fleeing in fear and some asleep in deep sleep, all depicted in colorful military clothing typical of the time. Hieratic and flanked by two praying angels, the risen imposing figure of Christ stands out against a sky that fades from lapis lazuli blue to white, while the hilly landscape in the background is comparable to other Umbrian landscapes painted by the artist in those years.