Malvasia e l’invenzione della pittura bolognese delle origini

Carlo Cesare Malvasia is generally considered to be a pioneer in the rediscovery of medieval painting, and few authors in the seventeenth century took such a keen interest in fourteenth-century artists. The Bolognese canon's objective, however, was first and foremost to attack the Florentine primacy claimed by Giorgio Vasari, and thus the precedence of Cimabue and Giotto over painters from other parts of Italy. In order to achieve his aim, Malvasia crowded the history of medieval Bolognese painting with fictitious personalities, and in all likelihood forged an inscription referring to Vitale da Bologna, with a date of execution fixed at 1320, a Madonna and Child by Simone di Filippo known as dei Crocifissi, which was actually painted in 1378 ca. (Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale).