Fontanellato

The origin of the Sanvitale fortress dates back to the waning of the Middle Ages, in the worn, refined climate of international Gothic, evolving again during the Mannerist period and again in the periods to follow. This sleek book takes the reader beyond the moat that surrounds the Rocca, inside the walls erected as early as the 14th century, to the apartments of the Sanvitale family, where the 18th-century furnishings and collected works are preserved, arriving at the opening of the hidden pearl. After the historical excursus led by Marzio Dall'Acqua we come to the sitting room of Diana and Actaeon, frescoed by Parmigianino, a 16th-century masterpiece of the art history of all time. The text edited by Franco Maria Ricci and Gianni Guadalupi reveals and at the same time proliferates its mysteries, imagining a new symbolic meaning for the Greek myth, in reference to the story of the clients Galeazzo Sanvitale and Paola Gonzaga. The images support this hypothesis by showing numerous details of the marvellous fresco, bearing witness to inspiration from Correggio, but also the very skilled hand of a Parmigianino who was still very young but already equal to the artistic task.