#12 breve | Luca Signorelli, Sacra Famiglia

Uffizi | Fabbriche di Storie

LUCA SIGNORELLI |

Sacra Famiglia |

Uffizi, Sala 31 |

Versione breve | La narrazione è di Magdy Hassan e Eliana Caputo, la voce di Marco Martinelli, Ermanna Montanari, Giacomo Armaroli |

Leggi la scheda completa dell'opera su uffizi.it

Luca Signorelli | Holy Family | Room 31

It all revolves around the Child. Joseph looks as though he has just arrived. With his leg, he encloses the space around Jesus, as if to protect him. His figure is bent to adapt to the shape of the painting. He approaches Mary and the child as if on tiptoe, with an attitude almost of reverence before the mystery of motherhood.

Mary is beautiful, at ease in this space. She is engrossed in the book she is reading. To our eyes she is not melancholy, as many have interpreted her, because she is thinking of the fate of Jesus... To our eyes, Mary is a serene mother who is reading and teaching her child. The book on the ground and the one in her hands represent the passage from the old religion, founded on law, to the new one, based on love. She is not afraid of what’s to come... She is living in the moment. Jesus has just turned around; he is surrounded by the tenderness and teachings of Mary, the adoration and protection of Joseph. With his hand, he stops his mother's reading, his gaze moves beyond the figure of his father.

Joseph’s face is hollowed and grey. The contrast between his dull complexion and the brightly colored scarf seems to reveal an inner state. It is as if he were bowing before the force of the divine plan. He has great difficulty in accepting not so much the mystery of a child that is not his, as the consequences of this mystery. He silently promises Mary and Jesus that he will do all he can to protect them.

Here we are: me, you and our son, Riccardo. We three inside a circle that is like a protective boundary, enclosing our ability to find strength together, to manage our pain. When he was born, a happy event abruptly turned into a tragedy. We were not aware of how painful the consequences of that trauma caused by just a few seconds without oxygen would be… Here he is, our son, at the heart of the turmoil that upturned our lives.

It wasn’t easy to accept the damage done to Riccardo. The circle of pain closed itself around our lives: every time we tried to get out, even in happy moments such as the birth of two more children, we had to go back inside again. Our pain is powerful, though, it is our strength.

It is the same strength that has enabled Riccardo to achieve the unthinkable. He feels pain but, unlike us, he can see beyond the circle, almost stubbornly.

I want my child not to depend on me. We have created a space for him, a social life. It's our life that is closed. When we get home, it’s as though nothing else exists. Our flat is small, movement is limited.

I don’t think it is a coincidence that this Holy Family made me stop and think. It was painted at the end of the 15th century by Luca Signorelli, the artist described by various art historians as the forerunner of Michelangelo. The figures have an almost sculpted quality, and the space around them is so claustrophobic that Mary and Joseph seem almost projected outside the surface of the painting. The idea of a circle that closes and isolates strikes a deep chord in me, as does St. Joseph’s attitude: attentive and protective, but apart.

Yet, with his entrance, Joseph gives balance to the composition, a kind of completion to the family.