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The painting, commissioned in 1630 by the tencìtt, the Milanese charcoal burners, to thank Mary for having preserved them from the plague, was welcomed into the exhibition venue of the Milan Polyclinic. It will be restored by the students of the Brera Academy and can be admired for free by citizens

Work images and canvas transfer

Milan, August 7 2022 – On the external wall of the building at number 2 of Vicolo Laghetto, a painting has always been placed, called "Madonna dei tencìtt": it is an ex voto depicting the Virgin with saints Sebastiano, Rocco and Carlo Borromeo, commissioned in December 1630 by the tencìtt, i.e. the Milanese charcoal burners, to thank Mary for having preserved them from the plague epidemic which had decimated the city at the beginning of the century.

The canvas (243x143 cm), framed and placed in a display case, was in very compromised conservation conditions due to its exposure to the sun and bad weather. Nonetheless, the work has great historical value, because it represents the oldest pictorial attestation of the Lazzaretto of Milan, the plan of which is depicted at the foot of the painting.

To preserve it from factors of degradation, the Municipality of Milan, owner of the building in Vicolo Laghetto and therefore of the work, has decided to remove it from its location and transfer it to a safe place equally open to the public.

The painting was thus removed from the metal case and frame last July 18, thanks to MM Casa, and was transported to the Milan Polyclinic, with which the Municipality of Milan will shortly sign a free loan agreement intended for the future valorisation of the work. The municipal council has in fact approved in recent days the signing by the municipality of a ten-year free loan contract, possibly renewable, with the hospital.

The historical link between the Ospedale Maggiore, now the Milan Polyclinic, and the Lazzaretto, which was wanted, built and administered for centuries by the hospital institution, is very close. The painting is now hosted in the exhibition space of the Polyclinic, "The treasures of Ca' Granda", in via Francesco Sforza 28, which is part of the national museum system. The solution guarantees not only physical and ideal contiguity with the historic location of the "Madonna dei tencìtt" in Vicolo Laghetto, but also free use by the public.

In the autumn, thanks to an agreement between the Sforzesco Castle and the restoration school of the Brera Academy, the painting will be restored and the technicians are certain that it will recover good readability. The restored "Madonna" will thus be able to be admired by visitors in 2023, the year in which the 150th anniversary of the death of Alessandro Manzoni is celebrated, who like no one else recounted the plague of the seventeenth century in Milan, due to which the ex voto painting was commissioned by Milanese coal miners.

In place of the painting there is now an information poster which will be replaced as soon as possible by a 1:1 scale color print on canvas.

The project for the protection, restoration and valorisation of the "Madonna dei tencìtt" is carried out thanks to the collaboration between the Municipality of Milan, the Milan Polyclinic, MM Casa, the Superintendency of Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape for the metropolitan city of Milan and the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera.