The brand new museum, a part of the bold Grande Brera cultural complicated, will open its doorways to the general public on Saturday (7 December).
After 5 many years of planning and delays, Milan is getting ready to unveil a serious new establishment devoted to trendy and up to date artwork, The Artwork Newspaper reviews.
The Palazzo Citterio, a sublime 18th-century constructing positioned only a stone’s throw from the famend Pinacoteca di Brera, will formally open on 7 December, coinciding with the feast of Milan’s patron saint.
The launch marks the completion of the long-anticipated “Grande Brera” undertaking, a cultural initiative designed to unite the Palazzo Citterio, the Pinacoteca di Brera, and the Braidense Library beneath one umbrella. This new complicated goals to place Milan as a serious cultural vacation spot, becoming a member of Florence and Rome by way of customer numbers and monetary success.
The purpose is “to create a big museum complicated in Milan on the mannequin of Florence and Rome by way of customer numbers and revenues,” mentioned Angelo Crespi, director of the Pinacoteca di Brera, in an interview with The Artwork Newspaper.
He pointed to the success of the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, which generated €63 million in income in 2023, and the Colosseum in Rome, which got here near €100 million. In distinction, the Pinacoteca di Brera earned simply €5 million throughout the identical interval.
As a part of the expanded cultural hub, the Palazzo Citterio will showcase a various assortment of over 200 works of recent and up to date artwork, complementing the Brera’s classical holdings. Among the many highlights are Pablo Picasso’s ‘Head of a Bull’ (1942), a 1919 still-life by Giorgio Morandi, Umberto Boccioni’s ‘Rissa in Galleria’ (1910), and Pellizza da Volpedo’s ‘La Fiumana’ (1898), a examine for his iconic ‘Il Quarto Stato’ (1901). Works by Amedeo Modigliani and Georges Braque may even be featured within the assortment.
The museum’s core assortment stems from key donations by the Jesi and Vitali households within the Seventies and Nineteen Eighties. Nevertheless, Crespi revealed that the Brera Museum continues to construct on this basis, with current acquisitions together with two new Morandi work donated by the Vitali household and extra works by Mario Schifano and Arturo Martini at present being acquired.
Wanting forward, Crespi predicts that the Citterio’s opening will considerably enhance customer numbers to the Brera district, with an estimated 50,000 extra guests anticipated to attend subsequent 12 months. In 2023, the Pinacoteca di Brera attracted round 500,000 guests.
In one other thrilling growth for the complicated, ‘The Final Supper’ (c. 1495-98) by Leonardo da Vinci, at present housed two kilometres from Brera, has been transferred to the Pinacoteca as a part of a nationwide cultural reshuffle. Crespi believes that this prestigious addition might propel the complicated’s annual revenues to €10 million and appeal to 1.5 million guests.
Plans for the Palazzo Citterio date again to 1972, when the Italian authorities bought the constructing following a proposal by Franco Russoli, the then-director of the Pinacoteca. Whereas an bold renovation plan by British architect James Stirling within the Nineteen Eighties was delayed and ultimately deserted on account of his premature demise, a €23 million renovation was accomplished in 2018. Nevertheless, that revamp confronted challenges with humidity and was deemed inadequate.
In anticipation of the Citterio’s opening, Crespi unveiled a brand new emblem for the Grande Brera complicated in September. The distinctive octagonal design can be utilized by a number of cultural establishments throughout the Palazzo di Brera, together with the Brera Astronomical Observatory, the botanical gardens, the Lombard Institute Academy of Science and Letters, the Brera Academy, and the Archivio Storico Ricordi.
Reflecting on the current modifications to Italy’s museum sector, Crespi attributed a lot of the elevated monetary stability of establishments like Brera to the 2014 reforms launched by Dario Franceschini, then the nation’s tradition minister. “The Franceschini reform… has permitted the Uffizi to grow to be one of the vital museums on the earth, not solely by way of its assortment but in addition by way of its revenue and customer numbers,” Crespi mentioned. “Many used to complain that [all] Italian museums have been unable to generate [collectively] as a lot income because the Louvre [in Paris]. As we speak Italian museums generate vital revenues.”
With its long-awaited opening, the Palazzo Citterio Museum is poised to grow to be a key participant in Italy’s rising cultural tourism business, attracting artwork lovers from around the globe to Milan’s historic Brera district.
