VENEZIA PALACE - MUSEUM OF VENEZIA PALACE (third part)

Altoviti Room

Frescoes and stuccos detached from the studio destroyed in 1888 of the Florentine banker Bindo Altoviti near Ponte Sant'Angelo and restored in 2004:

“Inventions of the twelve months” with, at the center, “Homage to Ceres” and at the short ends “Arno River crowned by Florence” and “River Tiber crowned by Rome” 1553 by Giorgio Vasari (1511/74)

Pastels

Twenty-two pastels 1700/mid-1800s including “Woman with child dressed in a Turkish way”, “Portrait of Maria Leczczyuska”, “Portrait of Mr. Kinchant in hunting costume”, “Tsarina Maria Fiodorowna” maybe by G.B. Lampi

On display there are also fans and miniatures, and at the center of the room, a painted Neapolitan sedan

Room 10 - Wooden Statues of the German School

“Virgin Mary” end of the fifteenth century maybe by Jorg Syrlin the Younger (about 1455/after 1521)

“St. Helena” early 1500 by Ivo Strigel (1430/1516)

Table carved early 1500 with “Death of the Virgin Mary”

“St. Michael defeating Satan” by Michael Pacher

Corridor of the Cardinals

Collection of pottery and porcelain from Austria, Germany, England, Japan, Russia, China and Italy, including “St. Peter” and “St. Andrew” half of 1700s by the manufacture of Capodimonte

Room 12 - Middle Ages

Plate of colored enamel “Christ Pantocrator” about XII/XIII century

“The plate, of considerable size, was accidentally found in Rome near S. Maria in Trastevere (...). This is a great product of medieval art made with a unique and highly refined technique. The hieratic pose of the figure was considered a hint of the Byzantine origin of this Christ Pantocrator, even if the art historians have repeatedly considered the enamel similar to the products of the school of Limoges. Recently the work has been attributed to a workshop active in central-southern Italy in the fourteenth century” (Official website of the Museum of Palazzo Venezia - www.museopalazzovenezia.beniculturali.it)

Byzantine ivories “Casanatense Triptych with Deesis (intercession) with Christ, the Virgin, St. John the Baptist and other saints” of the tenth century made for the emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus

“Wedding Box” with reliefs representing the stories of David

“Terracina Chest” piece of furniture of the tenth or eleventh century in which vestments and liturgical documents were kept

“It is one of the oldest chest extant today (...). The theme of the eternal battle between Good and Evil is the basis of the fight scenes inserted within the arches that decorate the panels, and the same meaning is also emphasized by the Original Sin of Adam and Eve in the center of the lower part. There are many influences that are gathered in this chest, both of Western and Eastern origin” (Official website of the Museum of Palazzo Venezia - www.museopalazzovenezia.beniculturali.it)

Room 14

Four reliefs with “History of St. Jerome” by Mino da Fiesole (1429/84) formerly in S. Maria Maggiore

Barsanti Collection

1100 bronzes donated in 1934 by the antiquarian Alfredo Barsanti including “Aries” by Andrea Briosco aka Riccio (about 1470/1532)

Bronze Pieces

113 bronzes pieces donated in 1963 by Ambassador Giacinto Auriti including “Bagpiper” and “Wanderer” by Jean Boulogne aka Giambologna (1529/1608)

“Female Bust” by François Duquesnoy (1597/1643)

“Reliefs of the portrait of Clement X Altieri (1670/76)” by Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598/1680)

Models in Terracotta

“Two plates with stories of St. Mark” by Jacopo Tatti aka Jacopo Sansovino (1486/1570)

“Head of Christ” about 1506 by Baccio da Montelupo (1469/about 1523)

Studies for the Trevi Fountain: “Ocean” by Pietro Bracci (1700/73) and “Abundance” by Filippo Della Valle (1698/1768)

Various models by Alessandro Algardi (1598/1654)

“Head of Black Man” for the fountain in Piazza Navona, “Angel holding the sign INRI for the Cross of Jesus” for Ponte Sant'Angelo and “Golden Papier Mache with Maria Raggi” for S. Maria sopra Minerva by Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598/1680)

“Head of Seneca” maybe by Guido Reni (1575/1642)

“St. Eustace among the lions of St. Agnes in Agony” by Melchiorre Caffà (1636/67)

In this collection there are also works by:

Ercole Ferrata (1610/86), Antonio Giorgetti (active since 1660/d. 1669), Pierre Legros (1666/1719), Camillo Rusconi (1658/1728), Giuseppe Mazzuoli (1644/1725), Cosimo Fancelli (1620/88), Camillo Pacetti (1758/1826), Francesco Mochi (1580/1654), Pierre-Étienne Monnot (1657/1733) e Jean-Antoine Houdon (1741/1828)

Lapidarium

In the upper gallery impressive collection of marble fragments ranging from antiquity to the Renaissance

Odescalchi Armory

Incredible collection of arms and armor that counts about 1,200 pieces put together by Prince Ladislao Odescalchi (1846/1922) the same man who founded in 1888 and named after himself Ladispoli, town of 42.000 inhabitants 20 miles from Rome

Studio Rooms

Collection of silver about 800 pieces of the period 1500s/1800s from northern Europe, Russia and Italy

Collection of oriental porcelain and glass about 150 pieces of the period 1400s/1700s from Venice, Persia and China

Collection of oriental porcelain about 400 pieces of the period 1600s/1800s from China and Japan

Collection of early medieval and medieval European porcelain and majolica

Paintings Section “The Incredulity of St. Thomas” by the Dutchman Dirk Van Baburen (about 1595/1624) and “Catherine II of Russia” about 1763 by Stefano Torelli (1712/84)

VENEZIA PALACE - MUSEUM OF VENEZIA PALACE (second part)

MUSEO DI PALAZZO VENEZIA

Museum of Venezia Palace

In the rooms of the Cybo Apartment and in the premises of the Palazzo Venezia formerly Viridarium of Paul II Barbo (1464/71), which was dismantled and moved in 1911 of about 100 m (330 feet)

Ceilings 1916 by Ludovico Seitz (1844/1908) in imitation of the style of the sixteenth century

VESTIBULE and ANTEROOM

“Bust of Pope Paul II” by the workshop of Paolo Taccone aka Paolo Romano (about 1415/77)

Venetian Paintings

“Double Portrait” about 1502 maybe by Giorgio Zorzi or Giorgio da Castelfranco aka Giorgione (1477-78/1510)

Mysterious and extremely beautiful painting where the light shines differently on the two characters, creating an effect of almost photographic realism

The young man in the foreground holds a wild orange bitter and sweet at the same time that the Renaissance was associated with the sufferings and the joys of love

“Madonna and Child” and “Head of a Young Woman” maybe by Antonio Pisano aka Pisanello (about 1390/about 1455)

The head of a young woman maybe was part of the lost decoration of the Basilica of St. John Lateran that Pisanello had carried out with Gentile da Fabriano in the first half of the fifteenth century and which was destroyed during the works of Francesco Borromini for the Jubilee of 1650

“Madonna and Child” by Paolo Veneziano (active about 1320/62)

Emilia-Romagna Paintings

“Crucifixion” first half of 1400s by Stefano da Ferrara

There are few biographical information regarding this painter and there is much uncertainty in the attributions. In this painting the expressions of torment of the faces are remarkable and innovative

“Christ Carrying the Cross” by Bernardino Zaganelli (about 1465/about 1511)

“Adoration of the Magi” by Lorenzo Sabatini (about 1530/76)

“Pieta” about 1579 by Lelio Orsi (1511/87)

“In this work there are influences of Correggio's poetry, especially in the pathos expressed by the figure of St. John the Evangelist, whereas the plasticity of the body of Christ is livid expression of a strong influence by Michelangelo, disseminated through engravings. Not to mention that from an elaboration of an idea by Michelangelo, namely the Deposition for Vittoria Colonna, comes the pose of Christ lying in the lap of the Mother” (Official website of the Museum of Palazzo Venezia - www.museopalazzovenezia.beniculturali.it)

Lazio, Umbria and Marche Regions Paintings

“Head of the Redeemer” from an artist of the school of Pietro de' Cerroni aka Pietro Cavallini (about 1240/about 1325)

“Great Painted Cross” from the church S. Tommaso dei Cenci

Processional banner “Virgin Mary of Mercy” by the Master of Staffolo

Rooms 4 and 5 - Tuscan Paintings

“Marriage of St. Catherine” by the Master of the Coronation of Christ Church

Small panel “Prophet Hosea” by Gherardo di Jacopo aka Starnina (active 1387/1409)

“Nativity” end of 1400s by the school of Filippo Lippi and Pesellino with a portrait of Lorenzo the Magnificent in the lower right

Remarkable “Head of the Redeemer” maybe by Benozzo di Lese aka Benozzo Gozzoli (1420/97), more probably by Fra' Giovanni da Fiesole aka Fra Angelico (about 1395/1455), maybe from the destroyed Chapel of Eugene IV Coldumer (1431/47)

“Episodes from the life of St. Catherine of Alexandria” by Bicci di Lorenzo (1373/1452)

“Vision of St. Bernard” by Francesco di Ubertino Verdi aka Bachiacca (1494/1557)

“Madonna and Child with Angels and Saints” by Mariotto di Cristofano (1393/1457)

Paintings on Canvas

Oldest and largest part of the collection added in 1919 from the collection Ruffo of Motta Bagnara:

“Marriage of St. Catherine” by Ciro Ferri (1634/89)

“Dance of the Nymphs” 1725 by Donato Creti (1671/1749)

“Restless temperament, haunted by an almost obsessive anxiety for perfection, Creti offers a varied range of expressive accents ranging from Veronese inclinations to his own classicism sometimes full of mannerism moods, some other times sublimated in purist formulas, almost neoclassical, largely ahead of its time. This work is a significant blend of his experiences: the party atmosphere is evoked with a Frenchified gallant grace, the traditional Arcadian landscape here is imbued with a rediscovery of more refined ways of the Emilian Mannerism, which give a more decanted and thin grace to this idyll” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

“David and Abigail” and “Finding of Moses” by Giuseppe Maria Crespi known as the Spanish (1665/1747) from Bologna

“Dead Christ” by Orazio Borgianni (1578/1616)

“The sons of Francesco Orsini” 1597 maybe by Tiberio Titi (1578/1637), the son of the painter Santi di Tito and official portraitist of the Medici Grand Dukes

“Wedding at Cana” by Francesco Solimena (1657/1747)

“Cleopatra” by Carlo Maratta (1625/1713) who represented the Egyptian queen with the face of his daughter Faustina as she dissolves a pearl in vinegar to prove her indifference to luxury

“St. Peter weeping” by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri aka Guercino (1591/1666)

Golden terracotta “Baptism of Jesus” and “Terracotta bust of Pope Innocent X Pamphilj (1644/55)” by Alessandro Algardi (1598/1654)

VENEZIA PALACE - MUSEUM OF VENEZIA PALACE (first part)

PALAZZO VENEZIA

Piazza Venezia 3

The first great work of civic Renaissance architecture in Rome, begun in the years 1455/64 for Cardinal Pietro Barbo

Expanded over the years 1465/68 after the election of Cardinal Pietro Barbo as Pope Paul II Barbo (1464/71)

1468/71 WING ALONG VIA DEL PLEBISCITO and COURTYARD which remained incomplete. Later on Cardinal Marco Barbo and Cardinal Lorenzo Cybo, nephew of Innocent VIII Cybo (1484/92), completed it

Intervention of Pope Paul III Farnese (1534/49) who connected it to his tower on Capitol Hill

It was used as a summer residence of the popes, before the construction of Palazzo del Quirinale, until 1564, when Pius IV Medici (1559/64) sold it partly to Venice to be the residence of their Ambassadors

It later became wholly owned by the Republic of Venice

In 1797 it passed to France and in 1814 to Austria

In 1916 it was confiscated by the Italian government and, after a restoration in the years 1924/30, it became a museum

Between 1929 and 1943 the reception rooms housed the office of Benito Mussolini and the Fascist Grand Council here on June 25, 1943 voted against Mussolini and took his political power away from him

The architect of the palace is unknown, but it is the first example in Rome from the model of a Renaissance Tuscan building according to the principles of Leon Battista Alberti

In the VAULT OF THE VESTIBULE there is the first example ever of modern use of cast concrete, a construction technique that had not been used since the ancient times: a crucial step for the development of technical architecture, fruit and expression of Western civilization

Among the artists who worked here for sure, using also travertine taken from the Colosseum: Giacomo da Pietrasanta (active since 1452/d. about 1497), Francesco da Borgo S. Sepolcro and Meo del Caprino

BALCONY

1714 for the Venetian ambassador Niccolò Duodo

CHAPEL OF OUR LADY OF GRACE

1600, rebuilt in 1911

Altar 1682 by G.B. Contini (1641/1723)

“Madonna and Child” by Bernardino Gagliardi (1609/1660)

On the right “Flight into Egypt” by Francesco Cozza (1605/82)

GARDEN

Fountain “Marriage of Venice to the Sea” 1729 by Carlo Monaldi (about 1690/1760), restored in 1930 by Giovanni Prini (1877/1958)

LOGGIA

1467/68 maybe by Baccio Pontelli (about 1450/92)

STAIRCASE

1930 by Luigi Marangoni (1872/1950)

ROOMS OF THE PAULINE PALACE

Royal Hall, Hall of Battles (originally Consistory), Hall of the Globe and Apartment Barbo subdivided and altered over the eighteenth and nineteenth century, restored in the years 1924/30

These rooms are currently used for temporary exhibitions

The painted decoration was widely integrated

In the Hall of the Globe, with the famous balcony from which Mussolini used to address the Italians, the painted architecture is attributed to Andrea Mantegna

VARESE PALACE

PALAZZO VARESE

Via Giulia 16

Built in 1495

Rebuilt incorporating earlier buildings in the years 1617/18 by Carlo Maderno (1556/1629) for Monsignor Diomede Varese

At the end of the seventeenth century it was acquired by the Atti family, and, when their line ended in 1770, it was occupied by the Congregation of Propaganda Fide

In the last century it was bought by the Mancini Jacobini family

“Maderno is remembered chiefly for two Roman works: the façade of S. Susanna and the completion of St. Peter's in the Vatican, but the catalog of his work is large and complex, and includes not only religious buildings. He was indeed one of the protagonists the process of renewal of residential and civil architecture of the early seventeenth century, as evidenced by his work in several Roman palaces. (...) Many attributive issues are still open: the fundamental point of reference is the 1971 monograph of Hibbard, the conclusions of which were, in some cases, updated and corrected by more recent studies (...). Hibbard had spread to the most the catalog of his works, intentionally confirming the attribution of numerous buildings, religious and civil, in which the actual contribution - if any - of Maderno was made​more complex by the intervention of several artists“ (Maria Cristina Loi - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

VALENTINI PALACE

PALAZZO VALENTINI

Via IV Novembre 119

1583/85 Fra' Domenico Paganelli for Cardinal Michele Bonelli nephew of St. Pius V Ghislieri (1566/72) and known as Palazzo Bonelli

Expanded in the first half of the seventeenth century maybe by Francesco Peparelli (active from about 1626/d. 1641)

In the years 1705/13 it was rented to the Marquis Francesco Maria Ruspoli who opened a theater in the building and hosted musicians such as George Frideric Handel, Alessandro Scarlatti and Angelo Corelli

In 1752 it was bought by Cardinal Giuseppe Renato Imperiali who arranged a rich library with 24,000 volumes also visited by Johann Joachim Winckelmann (1717/78)

From 1827 it belonged to the banker Vincenzo Valentini who had the FAÇADE FACING THE FORUM OF TRAJAN built in about 1830 by Filippo Navone (active first half of XIX century)

The Valentini family had in it a great picture gallery and lived here until 1870

Since 1873 it is the headquarters of the PROVINCE OF ROME, which transformed the courtyard and the interior in 1878 by Luigi Gabet (active 1858/78)

In the COURTYARD there are four ancient statues with modern changes:

“Valentini Aphrodite”

“Man with breastplate and head of Marcus Aurelius” maybe not relevant

“Hermes of Andros with head of Pertinax” not relevant

“Naked man with head of Caracalla” not relevant

The palace houses a collection of ancient statues and paintings which belonged to Vincenzo Valentini with works by artists such as Carlo Cignani and Ludovico Stern (1709/77) as well as many anonymous seventeenth century artists 

ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXPLORATIONS

1,800 square meters (20,000 square feet) residential district comprising

Two richly decorated houses (domus) of the fourth century AD maybe owned by a judge or a senator: walls decorated with polychrome panels and polychrome mosaic floors

Small private baths

The excavations were made from 2006 to 2010

Landfill of the sixteenth century known as BUTTO (throw) where ceramic plates were discovered, as well as everyday objects and even food scraps

Two sculptures of “Togati” of the second century AD without head that had been used as a fill for foundations in the sixteenth century

Stretch of paved Roman road very well preserved

Two “Fragments of huge monolithic columns” in Egyptian granite similar to the one near the Column of Trajan and probably part of the Temple of Trajan, whose exact topographic location is still the focus of academic debate. The columns had to have a minimum height of 15 m (49 feet) and perhaps it was even 20 m (65 feet) high

The area is beautifully accessible with very effective reconstructions using virtual reality and an exciting archaeological trail that goes up to the front of the Trajan's Column

An example that should be imitated in many other archaeological sites, almost a waking dream for those who love Rome, made possible thanks to the initiative of the great popularizer Piero Angela

TORLONIA PALACE

PALAZZO TORLONIA

Via della Conciliazione 30

Begun about 1500 by Cardinal Adriano da Corneto Castellesi secretary of Alexander VI Borgia (1492/1503) with a project maybe by Donato Bramante (1444/1514)

The works were completed in about 1520 maybe by Andrea Bregno (1418/1503)

It was donated unfinished in 1505 to the King of England, Henry VIII, who had commissioned the now disappeared external paintings to Polidoro Caldara aka Polidoro da Caravaggio

It was the seat of the English Embassy and was seized by the apostolic chamber after the Anglican schism

Between 1609 and 1635 it belonged to the Borghese family

In 1760 it was bought by the French bankers Giraud and was called PALAZZO GIRAUD

Since 1820 it belongs to the Torlonia family who restored it and built the rear wing. They are still the owners to this day

TORLONIA PALACE ON VIA DELLA LUNGARA

PALAZZO TORLONIA ALLA LUNGARA

Via dei Corsini 5

The 620 pieces of the TORLONIA COLLECTION founded in 1859 by Alessandro Torlonia were exhibited until the Fifties in seventy-seven rooms

It was sculptures, busts, sarcophagi and ancient reliefs collected by the family and, for the most part, bought from the most important private collections:

115 pieces from the Giustiniani collection and other pieces from the Savelli and Caetani collections as well as from the Cavaceppi studio

The collection was later enriched with the excavations in areas owned by the Torlonia family: Villa dei Quintili, the Circus of Maxentius on the Appian Way (the tomb of Romulus was transformed into a “country home” with the addition of a porch in the nineteenth century) Cerveteri, the Port of Trajan in Fiumicino and the area around Lake Fucino which was drained by Alessandro in the mid-nineteenth century (he later founded the Bank of Fucino of which the family is still a shareholder) and other locations

It is considered the most important private collection of ancient sculptures in the world and it constitutes for quantity and quality almost a third of all the ancient sculptures in Rome

Among the masterpieces shamefully hidden:

The famous “Hestia Giustiniani” perhaps a copy of the second century AD from a bronze original of about 470 BC

In the seventeenth century it was property of the Giustiniani family who kept it in their palace and from whom took its name

Hestia was the Greek goddess of hearth and home, even if this beautiful Roman statue was perhaps a Hera or Demeter, as a type of representation in the round of Hestia in Greek sculpture is not yet known

Johann Joachim Winckelmann (1717/78) considered it erroneously an example of the kind of classical Greek art described as “severe”

The statue is now in the Palazzo Torlonia on Via della Conciliazione

Other pieces:

Two copies of the “Eirene” from the original by Kefisodotos

An “Athlete” from the original by Myron of Eleutere (about 500/about 440 BC)

A “Diadoumenos” from the original by Polykleitos of Argos (about 490/about 425 BC)

A copy of a “Feminine Figure” from the group of Menelaus

An “Aphrodite Anadyomene”

A “Statue of woman sitting with a mastiff” among the most significant examples of such neo-attic representations

“Relief with Vesta during a sacrifice” found near the Port of Trajan in 1867

The “Relief of the Port of Rome”

A “Greek object offered as a vow to some Athenians deity” of the fifth century BC

Moreover:

“107 Imperial Busts” including “Colossal and veiled portrait of Plotina”, “Julia Domna”, “Portrait of a Man veiled known as Massenzio” from the Circus of Maxentius and some of the most remarkable examples of portraits dating back to the late empire

Until the Fifties the collection was accessible to those who would ask the Torlonia, but they would discretionarily limit the entrance only to the rich and nobles, so that it is said that Professor Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli had to pretend to work as a cleaner to see the collection

The end of this amazing private museum was chilling: in 1979 seventy-seven rooms were converted into 93 STUDIO APARTMENTS for rent. The whole operation was done in a completely illegal way as it was established by the Supreme Court!

The poor sculptures were either closed in boxes in the basement where they are still now or were transported elsewhere

For years a controversy has been going on between the City of Rome and the Torlonia family so that the 620 treasures could be finally exhibited

Palazzo Rivaldi, which is being renovated, has been proposed as a suitable place for a new museum

TESTA PICCOLOMINI PALACE

PALAZZO TESTA PICCOLOMINI

Via della Dataria 22

Restructured after 1670 by Basilio Bricci (1621/92) and his sister Plautilla Bricci (1616/about 1701) who made a nice decoration with the arms of the Piccolomini on the windows of the main floor and the bottom of the cornice

Renovation 1718/19 by Filippo Barigioni (about 1680/1753), a pupil of Carlo Fontana for Giovanni Ferrante Testa Piccolomini

TAVERNA PALACE

PALAZZO TAVERNA

Via di Monte Giordano 36

Built in the fifteenth century for the ORSINI FAMILY on the ruins of the fortress of Giordano Orsini of the fourteenth century

The fortress had been built in turn over an original nucleus of the twelfth century, the Castle of Giovanni Concione from Riano

The impressive building complex is located on MONTE GIORDANO (Mount Jordan) artificial mound believed by some to be corresponding to the Amphitheater of Statilius Taurus, which, however, was most probably built on the site of Palazzo Cenci Bolognetti

It is mentioned by Dante in Canto XVIII of his Inferno: From the one hand, everyone has the face to the castle and go to St. Peter, from the other side they go towards the mountain

From 1286 to 1688 it was the headquarters of the powerful Orsini family

From 1688 to 1888 it belonged to the Gabrielli di Regola

Since 1888 it is property of Taverna counts from Milan who still own it and rent for receptions

FOUNTAIN OF THE ACQUA PAOLA

Fourfold basin within an exedra of laurels 1615/18 by Antonio Felice Casoni (1559/1634) modified in 1700

AUGUSTA TOWER 1880

MAIN FLOOR

Large paintings including “Esther before Ahasuerus” and “Finding of Moses” about 1711 by the great painter from the Veneto region Sebastiano Ricci (1659/1734) and other paintings by G.B. Pittoni (1687/1767)

“The art of Sebastiano Ricci from Belluno can be considered a true paradigm of painting of the eighteenth century. Because it exemplifies what will be the constant tendency of all the best painters, namely the analysis of multiple experiences of the present and the past, extended far beyond the limits of their school, to be summarized in a modern angle, both interpretative and technical. Such a re-enactment of the still fertile seventeenth century matrices, implemented in various youth travel with broad diversification, allowed him to make a clear break against the now fruitless local culture” (Giancarlo Sestieri)

“Death of Virginia Romana” 1793/1804 by Vincenzo Camuccini (1771/1844)

Frescoes 1688/90 by Bonaventura Lamberti (about 1653/1721) and 1812/16 by Liborio Coccetti (1739/1816)

SPADA PALACE - SPADA GALLERY (third part)

Room III

The room was known as GALLERY OF THE CARDINAL and was designed in the years 1636/37 by Paolo Marucelli (1594/1649)

Ceiling decorations “Four parts of the world, the four elements and the four seasons” 1698/99 by Michelangelo Ricciolini (1654/1715)

“Portrait of Youth” maybe by Annibale Carracci (1560/1609)

“Allegory of the Massacre of the Innocents” about 1639 and “Sacrifice of Iphigenia” 1640 by Pietro Testa (1612/50) Lucca engraver who committed suicide in the Tiber for disappointments in his painting career

“Astronomers” about 1645 and “Cain and Abel” by Niccolò Tornioli (1598/1651)

The Astronomers exalts the new astronomical discoveries and in particular the telescope of 1609 by Galileo Galilei

At the center of the picture is Nicolaus Copernicus showing the phases of the moon, to the left Ptolemy and Aristotle, and on the right the woman with the turban is Astronomy itself. Galileo Galilei (1564/1642) had recently died and this painting was a burning issue at the time

Some scholars saw a quote of the Narcissus attributed to Caravaggio in the man on the right looking into the telescope, as well as one of the reasons they would ascribe with certainty the Narcissus to Caravaggio

“The Vestal Virgins” about 1670 by Ciro Ferri (1634/89)

“Landscape” about 1555 by the visionary Niccolò dell'Abate (about 1510/71)

“There are two scenes socially opposite: the aristocratic wild boar hunting with knights and ladies in the foreground, and the popular procession with the greasy pole in the distance. The fantasy architecture that gives the entire composition a fairytale feel, refers to the Flemish landscapes and to those of Dosso Dossi” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

“Feast of Mark Anthony and Cleopatra” about 1701 by Francesco Trevisani (1656/1746) from Istria, with Cleopatra dissolving a pearl in wine to show her indifference to wealth

“In the episode, described with theatrical taste, are placed precious details that combine features of sixteenth-century Venetian tradition with those of Roman classicism” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

“Allegory of Music and Poetry” and “Allegory of Painting and Sculpture” by Sebastiano Conca (1680/1764)

“Summer and Autumn” and “Spring and Winter” by Luigi Garzi (1638/1721)

“The Abduction of Aeneas” copy of Giacinto Campana (1600/about 1650) from the original by Guido Reni now in the Louvre. Reni himself revised this copy

“The Death of Dido” about 1631 by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri aka Guercino (1591/1666) composed almost like a scene out of the newly born Italian musical theater, also known as opera, the most comprehensive art form that would eventually spread throughout the world

“The work is remarkable for the scenographic vision and the richness of the costumes is made with plastic and coloristic sense, characteristics of the artist's work, learned from experiences in Veneto, Bologna and Ferrara” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

Two paintings of the same subject “Boreas Abducting Orythia” one by Francesco Solimena (1657/1747) and one by Giovanni Francesco Romanelli (1610/62) from Viterbo, a pupil of Pietro da Cortona

“Bacchus” by Pier Francesco Mola (1612/66)

“Spring or Flora” about 1680 by Carlo Cignani (1628/1719)

“Looting of a village” by Peter Snayers (1592/1666)

Very realistic “Portrait of young man” by a follower of Annibale Carracci

“View of a beach by moonlight” by Egbert van der Poel (1621/64)

“Death of Cleopatra” 1706 and “Death of Marcantonio” 1702 by Domenico Maria Muratori (1661/1742) for Cardinal Fabrizio Spada

“Christ and the Samaritan” about 1677 and the sketch of “Triumph in the name of Jesus” for the vault of the Chiesa del Gesù (Church of Jesus) by G.B. Gaulli aka Baciccio (1639/1709)

“S. Lucia's shoulders” about 1632 by Francesco Furini (1603/46)

In this very original painting S. Lucia holds a plate with her eyes which had been removed by the torturers. An opportunity for the Florentine Francesco Furini to show off his specialty: painting beautiful bare backs of women

“He preferred the female figure and created a kind of refined painting genre whose subject, inspired by the poems of chivalry, the biblical tradition and mythology, were appreciated by scholarly collectors. Deeply stimulated by the trip to Venice and the painting by Pietro da Cortona (working in Florence in 1637), Furini became in his maturity a painter increasingly fluid and soft” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

“Portrait of Angela Mignanelli” about 1730 by Marco Benefial (1684/1764)

“The smug expression of the face, not rigid, but natural and of remarkable psychological intensity is enhanced by using soft and pasty brush strokes which give brightness to the eyes, sweet and mysterious at the same time. (...) The artist seems to overcome the ways of Roman portraiture of the seventeenth-eighteenth century and get closer to the French one, anticipating more casual formal solutions that will be in vogue especially in the second half of 1700s at the hands of Mengs, Goya, and Pier Leone Ghezzi” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

“Landscape with windmills” 1607 by Jan Brueghel the Elder (1568/1625)

At the center of the room two globes 1616/22 by the Dutch cartographer William Bleau

“Statue of a philosopher sitting” of the beginning of the first century AD

Room IV

“David with the Head of Goliath” about 1610 by Orazio Lomi aka Orazio Gentileschi (1563/1639) from Pisa

About 50 cm (20 inches) of the painting in the lower part have been lost, where the body of Goliath was

“The painting, in which the hand of Agostino Tassi has been identified in the landscape, reflects the classicist ideals of Carracci's style, and the realistic ones that enrich the scene into several parts, as one can see in the rendering of the coat. A terse light affects the body of David, enhancing the volumetric characteristics, in memory of the original Tuscan Mannerist training of the painter” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

“Christ and the adulteress” and “Christ tempted by the devil” by Mattia Preti (1613/99)

Christ and the adulteress is a work of extraordinary visual impact and powerful religious significance. The dizzying cleavage of the adulterous woman stuns and draws the eye inexorably as Christ indicates it and watches us expliciting in the act the message of salvation by grace that disregards human works

The message is clear: God's mercy can save us from the sins of the flesh, even from such white and unavoidably erotic flesh

Isn't this cleavage after all so dazzling illuminated by the same light that comes from the right and that shines on Christ's face and also on the beautiful gesture of forgiveness of His left hand?

“La Pietà” by Orazio Borgianni (1578/1616)

“Allegory of Astronomy” by G.B. Magni aka Modenino (about 1592/1674)

Five paintings of the so-called Bamboccio Pieter Van Laer (about 1595/1642)

“The value of detectable anti-rhetorical realism in his paintings reveals a fundamental part of the culture of the Dutch painter in addition to his mastery in the use of light and shadow. His painting and that of his many followers - the Bamboccianti such as Jan Miel, Michiels Sweerts - proposed the discovery of a papal city not monumental, of a Rome that invited reflection on social policies” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

Three paintings in the so-called bambocciante style including “Death of the donkey” and the historical view “Revolt of Masaniello” by Michelangelo Cerquozzi (1602/60)

“Accents more distinctly typical of everyday life than the ones of Pieter Van Laer are detectable in the lively folklore scenes of Cerquozzi, also a follower of Laer, even if he developed an independent style facing also sacred subjects of large format, battles and still lifes” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

“The Holy Family with St. John the Baptist” and “Herodias with the head of St. John the Baptist” by Jean Valentin aka Valentin de Boulogne (about 1591/1632)

“St. John the Evangelist” by the Frenchman Nicolas Tournier (1590/post 1657)

“Market” about 1650 by Willem Reuter (1642/1681), influenced by Michiel Sweerts

“Allegory of Vanity” by Andrea Podestà (about 1608/before 1674)

“Capture of Christ” by a follower of Gherardo delle Notti, maybe Trophime Bigot (about 1579/1649)

“S. Cecilia” and “Madonna nursing the Child” by Artemisia Gentileschi (1593/about 1652)

“Worthy disciple of her father Orazio and highly regarded since 1614 in the Florentine art scene, she lived for a long time in Naples, where the local painting environment represented by artists like Cavallino and Caracciolo was deeply influenced by the Caravaggio's knowledge of Artemisia. She inherited from her father the taste for precious fabrics and a preference for the rendering of golden and firm flesh through a naturalistic study of shadows and lights rousing stunningly beautiful effects” (Carlo Bertelli, Giuliano Briganti, Antonio Giuliano)

“Both works have been painted in her youth and are characterized by the delicate and refined drawing of colors, for the firmness and for the expressive intensity of the two female figures, the result of the artistic experiences of his father” (Maria Lucrezia Vicini)

Plaster cast “Divine love defeats profane love” about 1630 maybe a model of the bas-relief at the Galleria Doria Pamphilj by the Flemish artist François Duquesnoy (1597/1643)