Rijksmuseum Twenthe - Het kunstmuseum van Enschede

Raphael’s first angel comes to Enschede

The ‘In the heart of the Renaissance’ exhibition will be even more special than we expected. Not only will Raphael’s Christ giving a blessing be coming to Enschede: so will another of his masterpieces, a magnificent head of an angel from 1501. This is his earliest surviving work, painted when he was eighteen.

The panel was part of the Baronci altar, painted for the church of Sant’Agostino in Città di Castello, near Urbino. The altarpiece was seriously damaged by an earthquake in 1789, and large parts of it were lost.


Four extra paintings

Rijksmuseum Twenthe director Arnoud Odding also announced that three paintings apart from Raphael’s angel had been added to the exhibition. The selection of pictures, which is currently on display in Helsinki and was previously shown in Warsaw, will include extra works by Tintoretto and Savoldo, and a spectacular Lotto loaned by the Collezione Palma Camozzi Vertova. This brings the total to forty-five, and the exhibition also features artefacts such as sixteenth-century suits of armour, a sword, and Roman antiquities.


“In the heart of the Renaissance” opens on 11 February.


Lorenzo Lotto (Venice c. 1480–1566 Loreto), Madonna and child with St John the Baptist and St Catherine of Alexandria, oil on canvas, 74 x 68 cm, 1522, Costa di Mezzate, Collectie Palma Camozzi Vertova.


Lorenzo Lotto

Lorenzo Lotto will now be represented by two works: the magisterial Adoration of the shepherds (1530) and Madonna and child with St John the Baptist and St Catherine of Alexandria (1522). He is renowned for his bold, distinctive and sophisticated combinations of colours. The 1522 work features a unicorn, whose exact significance is unclear, but which may symbolise hard work and foresight. The lamb in The adoration of the shepherds also plays an unusual role, nuzzling the infant Jesus. 


Lorenzo Lotto (Venice c. 1480–1566 Loreto), The adoration of the shepherds, c. 1530, Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo, Brescia


Savoldo and Tintoretto

The Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice is lending two paintings: The annunciation by Giovanni Gerolamo Savoldo, from 1538, and a Tintoretto portrait of the procurator Jacopo Soranzo dating from 1550. Savoldo is also known as Girolamo da Brescia. Rijksmuseum Twenthe has an unusual portrait by him of a young man playing the flute, and a Bible scene. Only forty of his works have survived, including six portraits. Savoldo makes distinctive use of simple realism and chiaroscuro.