San Marino

2023

Commemorative coin

The 500th anniversary of the death of Luca Signorelli

Official Journal of the European Union

The design shows an angel in the centre, a detail from the painting ‘Il Paradiso’ by Luca Signorelli, preserved in the Chapel of San Brizio in the Cathedral of Orvieto. At the left-hand side is the letter R, identifying the Mint of Rome. In semi-circle at the bottom left is the word ‘SIGNORELLI’. At the right-hand side is the name of the issuing country ‘SAN MARINO’, and at the top the years ‘1523 2023’. In the lower centre are the initials of the author Marta Bonifacio, MB. The coin’s outer ring depicts the 12 stars of the European flag.

Additional information

Luca Signorelli (≈1450-1523), also called Luca da Cortona after his birthplace, was an Italian Renaissance painter and principal master of the Florentine School. As a pupil of Piero della Francesca in Arezzo, he learned especially perspective and nude painting, in which his detailed anatomical knowledge is visible. From 1482 to 1484 he executed a fresco on the story of the biblical Moses in the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Between 1499 and 1502 he painted, among others, the fresco cycles 'Apocalypse' and 'Last Judgement' in the Chapel of the Madonna di San Brizio in Orvieto Cathedral. The latter depicts the elect being called to heaven and the damned being led to hell. This work influenced Michelangelo's Last Judgment fresco in the Sistine Chapel. The coin motif shows an angel from the fresco "The Chosen in Paradise".

Edge lettering

Designer