Focusing on the Florentine paintings in the Alte Pinakothek (Old Picture Gallery), an interdisciplinary research project of the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen (Bavarian State Painting Collections) and the Doerner Institute has analyzed one of the most important collections of paintings worldwide to have emerged from the center of the Italian Renaissance. For the first time, approximately 80 works – including panels by Giotto, Fra Angelico, Domenico Ghirlandaio, Filippo Lippi, Sandro Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci and Andrea del Sarto – have undergone extensive art historical and technological analysis.
The essays for the collection catalogue present new findings about commissions and provenances, situate a work in an artist’s oeuvre, clarify iconographic questions, and also introduce reassessments with regard to the histories of genre and function. Moreover, a detailed investigation of painting techniques and the materials used discloses working methods practiced in the workshops, allowing for a better understanding of the connections between technical and stylistic changes.