Previtali triptych reunited after nearly 200 years
Three panels of an altarpiece by Andrea Previtali have been reunited in Italy after almost two centuries apart, according to EUToday. The triptych forms the centrepiece of an exhibition that opened at Museo Villa Bassi Rathgeb in Abano Terme on 17 October.
- Three panels of an Andrea Previtali altarpiece have been reunited for an exhibition in Abano Terme.
- The work was painted around 1515 for a church in Serina, near Bergamo.
- The display examines Previtali's training under Giovanni Bellini and his connections with other northern Italian painters.
Painted around 1515 for the Church of the Annunciation in Serina, near Bergamo, the work has been brought together through cooperation between the Diocese of Bergamo and the museum, near Padua. Its panel depicting a bishop saint belongs to the museum's permanent collection. The two companion panels have joined it for the exhibition, allowing visitors to view the surviving composition together. The report does not give the date or circumstances in which the paintings were separated.
A triptych combines a central image with two flanking panels. Their reunion restores relationships between figures and religious imagery that become harder to recognise when the parts are displayed independently. The bishop saint panel entered the museum through the collection of art historian Roberto Bassi Rathgeb, whose work helped renew interest in Previtali. The exhibition uses the reunited painting to examine the artist's approach to devotional compositions and his place within the Venetian Renaissance.
Previtali trained in Giovanni Bellini's workshop in Venice before developing a career connecting Venice and Bergamo. An inscription on his 1502 Madonna and Child with Donor, held by the Musei Civici di Padova, identifies him as Bellini's pupil. The exhibition places his work alongside paintings from that artistic environment, including Bellini's Saint Justina, lent by the Museo Bagatti Valsecchi in Milan. It also considers his later encounter with the work of Lorenzo Lotto in Bergamo.
Andrea Previtali: Disciple of Giovanni Bellini runs until 7 February 2027 and is curated by Raffaele Campion and Barbara Maria Savy. Organised by the municipality of Abano Terme with the University of Padua and Italian heritage authorities, it includes works connected with Francesco Bissolo, Girolamo da Santacroce, Palma il Vecchio and Cariani. A separate section uses physical and digital displays to explain Renaissance workshop techniques, from preparing paintings to constructing and completing them.