Plautilla Nelli and her Last Supper

Sister Plautilla Nelli’s magnificent painting, the Last Supper, has returned to the museum spotlight at Santa Maria Novella, Florence, Italy.

In Renaissance Florence, Plautilla Nelli founded a workshop of nun-artists and authored a 21-foot Last Supper she would sign, ‘Pray for the Paintress’.

Over four centuries later, international art lovers band together to salvage her forgotten masterpiece. Now the world’s largest work by an early female artist is on public display in the Museum of Santa Maria Novella. A four-year journey of restoration and research, this quest is a bridge across time and the contemporary answer to Nelli’s appeal, where the past and present meet and make history, in Florence, today.

INDEX:

Tommaso Sacchi / Introduction

TODAY AND IN HISTORY

Linda Falcone / Unveiling

Silvia Colucci / On the trail of Plautilla’s Last Supper

CONSERVATION AND DETAILS

Rossella Lari / Shared impressions and choral knowledge

Silvia Ciappi / Transparencies of light

Francesco Morena / A porcelain symphony

WORK IN PROGRESS

Susanna Bracci, Donata Magrini / Plautilla’s palette

NELLI ANEW

Andrea Muzzi / ‘A nun who paints’

Padre Aldo Tarquini O.P. / In black and white

Bibliography

Advancing Wome Artists Foundation

Advancing Women Artists, an American not-for-profit organization, is committed to identifying and restoring artwork by women in Florence’s museum storerooms. Myriad paintings and sculptures by groundbreaking women artists have been overlooked for centuries and countless works are currently in need of restoration. As of today, compelling artistic treasures continue to be a silent, undiscovered part of the city’s creative heritage. Through education (publications, seminars, and conferences) and by exhibiting these works in Florence and farther afield, it is possible to reveal this vital cultural legacy and promote its importance in Italy and the world.

www.advancingwomenartists.org