Painting in Emilia

December 1, 2012 - Sydney J. Freedberg, chief curator, National Gallery of Art In honor of The Age of Correggio and the Carracci: Emilian Painting of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries exhibition, on view from December 19, 1986, to February 16, 1987, at the National Gallery of Art, Sydney J. Freedberg explains the genesis of the exhibition and introduces many of its masterpieces, including 79 paintings created in the northern Italian province of Emilia between 1500 and 1700. Sir John Pope-Hennessy (then of the Metropolitan Museum of Art) chose the 16th-century works and Freedberg selected those painted in the 17th century. In this lecture recorded on December 26, 1986, Freedberg leads the audience through the exhibition, promising that even though his tour begins with the grandeur of Correggio, there are marvelous surprises of equal mastery to come.