Exhibition conceived and organised by Fondazione Cassa dei Risparmi di Forlì, in collaboration with the municipality of Forlì and the Musei San Domenico, and under the general direction of Prof. Gianfranco Brunelli. The aim of the project is to provide an exhibition dedicated to one of most legendary, mysterious and misrepresented historical female figures: Mary Magdalene.
The exhibition aims to investigate, through some of the most precious and fascinating works of art (from the 3rd century AD to the 20th century), the unsolved mystery of this woman. She has been the subject of countless works of art, books and movies, as well as dedicated events. Artists, above all, have granted her a place of honour in their works, making her the subject of masterpieces that have shaped, along the fabric of time, art itself and its developments. Each age has looked at her as if in a mirror, looking at itself; each age has contemplated her, searching for an ideal of itself; each age has watched over and spied on her, discovering its own vices within its virtues. Over the centuries, an infinite number of other figures have been lumped in and muddled together with this simple woman, making her a symbol of sin and repentance, loyalty and suffering, obsession and love, fecundity and wisdom, carnality and sanctity, creating a narrative weave that, through art above all, has made her the “dark object of desire” of our history.