Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 105. (Budapest, 2006)
ANNUAL REPORT - A 2006. ÉV - VILMOS TÁTRAI: The New Permanent Exhibition of the Italian Collection of the Old Masters' Gallery
from seventeenth-century schools which have had a permanently mutual effect on each other yet have preserved their local character —are arranged in several rows, following the example set by aristocrats in their own collections. The design of the new installation has focused on the various difficulties that arise in persuading visitors to accept the old masters, and concerted efforts have been made to create a high-level, visitor-oriented environment for the exhibited works. Indispensable to achieving this was the need to closely cooperate with interior designers, namely from the NARA1ER Architecture Studio, who have a wealth of experience both in design and execution. The various wall colours, the highlighting of certain works through special design, the special lighting effects, the placing statues among the paintings and the renewal of the inscriptions all played an outstanding role in the general director's ideas for the installation. In regard to colour selection, the Quattrocento room w r as painted steel blue, the Gothic room a lighter version of this, while the Boltraffio-Raphael room was painted a darker terracotta colour. The room housing the Mannerist cabinet-pictures was painted olive, while the big hall contrasting Venetian and Central-Italian Cinquecento works became amber. The wall colours of the other rooms —to counterpoise the fortes and pianos —remained off-white. Opaque glass backgrounds emphasize the Madonnas of Boltraffio, Raphael and Correggio, Giorgione's Portrait of a Youth by and Bronzino's Adoration of the Shepherds. Ghirlandaio's St Stephen, Sebastiano del Piombo's Portrait of a Youth, Annibale Carracci's Christ and the Woman of Samaria along with the Sleeping Girl by an unknown Roman painter were placed on separate, freestanding pedestals, detached from the wall. In the case of the Guardi brothers' processional banner, painted on both sides, it was quite obvious that it would be put on display fixed between two sheet glasses. The pieces of the Old Sculpture Collection —the Madonna from the Ghiberti workshop, Verrocchio's Vir Dolorum and Tiziano Aspetti's two andirons —not only make the gallery more varied, but also remind the viewer of the former close links between the different branches of art. The northern Quattrocento, the Boltraffio-Leonardo and the Mannerist rooms are only illuminated by spotlights, since their glass ceilings are covered. Consequently, in these rooms, similarly to the Trecento cabinets where there is no natural light, the individually illuminated paintings emerge out of the penumbra creating a "Wunderkammer" effect. The inscriptions are placed on stands, wdiich, together with the well-chosen letter types, make them easier to read and facilitate an easier connection with the works. Due to the necessity of building a flight of stairs, the room of the Trecento works became somewhat lost, but in the end an idea by the interior designers not only saved it, but even
