A 30-year dispute over a fresco by the Renaissance master Piero della Francesca shows no sign of waning after an Italian court ruled that it must be returned to where it was originally painted, even though that location now predominantly serves as a cemetery.
The Madonna del Parto depicts a pregnant Virgin Mary and is considered one of the greatest works from the Renaissance period.
Completed in about 1460, it is believed della Francesca made the works, in situ, to adorn a wall behind the altar of the Chapel of Santa Maria di Momentana in Monterchi, a hilltop town in the Arezzo area of Tuscany.
The wall and its fresco survived a devastating earthquake in 1785. The painting was later detached from the wall and displayed in an altar-niche in the rebuilt chapel, significantly reduced in size to make way for a cemetery.
It was attributed to della Francesca only in 1889 and survived another earthquake in 1917 before being restored and moved in 1992 to the building of a former school in Monterchi that had been converted into the Madonna del Parto museum.
The transfer to the museum, which today attracts about 40,000 visitors a year, some of them female pilgrims seeking protection during their pregnancy, sparked a tangled legal battle over the painting’s location between the council in Monterchi, the local diocese, regional authorities and the ministry of culture.
The tussle entered a new stage when the Council of State, Italy’s highest administrative court, recently ruled for the painting to be returned to its original home.
Alfredo Romanelli, the mayor of Monterchi, argued that the tiny chapel, located slightly on the edge of town and rebuilt again in 1956, no longer exists in its original form.
“Putting the symbol of the nativity in a cemetery in the outskirts, among 3,000 graves, doesn’t seem like a good idea to me,” he told La Stampa. “It takes some imagination.”
Romanelli added that the chapel is unsuitable for the masterpiece because of the light and has insufficient space to accommodate tourists.
After the issue over the appropriateness of the chapel’s setting was raised in parliament, Romanelli was summoned to meet the deputy culture minister, Lucia Borgonzoni, on 20 April. He said he could not comprehend the “senseless” decision by the court and questioned who was behind it.
Vittorio Sgarbi, an art critic and deputy with close ties to the former prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, said it was a good opportunity for the work to be transferred from “a vaguely clinical” location to the place where it was produced, arguing that the chapel could be expanded to make space for “religious tourism”.
Della Francesca is believed to have made the painting in honour of his mother, Romana di Pierino, who was from Monterchi.
