Giotto: The Scrovegni Chapel

Giotto di Bondone, 1267-1337, is best known for the frescoes he painted in the Arena Chapel, Padua, his best preserved work. This notable series of 38 frescoes illustrate the life of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary and show Giotto's uncompromising rigor, realism and inspired imagination. In this exquisite, magnificently illustrated volume, Claudio Bellinati's texts help the reader to discover the literal, poetic and artistic significance of every scene. The elegant layout accompanies each fresco with the passage from the Gospels or Apocrypha to which it refers, and an iconographic reading. For the first time, there is a complete analysis of Giotto's magnificent narrative. Three small mirrors still decorate the halo of Christ in Judgment today. When the morning light came from the east and sun's rays, shining through the glass window fell on Christ's halo a new splendor spread through the chapel, imbuing the scene with solemnity, centrality and beauty. It was then that the mysterium Mariae