Ecce location Messina faces battle to bring Renaissance master ‘home’

On 28 December 1908, the city of Messina was struck by what is still considered the deadliest catastrophe in modern European history.

- Lorenzo Tondo

In less than a minute, an earthquake of magnitude 7.1 killed half its population and levelled much of the historical centre.

Along with homes, churches and monuments, invaluable artworks and documents were lost, including paintings by the city’s greatest son, Antonello da Messina - the artist widely credited with transforming Renaissance art.

In just 37 seconds, the memory of one of the greatest painters in history was buried along with his former home and its people.

Last week, however, the Italian government quietly secured a rare example of Antonello’s work at auction in New York. It spent $14.9m (£10.9m) on an Ecce Homo by the Renaissance master - an intensely human depiction of the suffering Christ wearing a crown completed in Messina around 1460.

Museums across Italy are now holding their breath as the culture ministry deliberates over where the work, sold at Sotheby’s, will be displayed. Among the frontrunners are the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan and the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice - both heavyweights of the Italian museum circuit. Yet the decision could ultimately favour the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples, the city where the painter is thought to have trained.