Galleria degli Antichi and Palazzo del Giardino

Last updated
From left to right: Galleria degli Antichi, white Palazzo del Giardino, and small corridor Sabbioneta 2010 17 (8189115056).jpg
From left to right: Galleria degli Antichi, white Palazzo del Giardino, and small corridor

The Galleria degli Antichi and the Palazzo del Giardino are adjacent, contemporaneous, Renaissance-style buildings located on Piazza d`Armi #1 in Sabbioneta, in the Province of Mantua, region of Lombardy, Italy. Prior to 1797, the buildings were connected to the Rocca or Castle of Sabbioneta (razed by Napoleon's forces during the Siege of Mantua), and the gallery once housed the Gonzaga collection of antique Roman statuary and hunting trophies. While the architectural design of the gallery is striking, the richness of the interior decoration of the palazzo is also dazzling.

Contents

Galleria degli Antichi

Exterior of gallery Sabbioneta-galleria degli antichi.jpg
Exterior of gallery

.

The galleria or gallery was once a corridor, aligned south to north, linked to the large Sabbioneta Castle that stood inside the walled town. Described as a "grand corridor" of the castle, it was built with stone and brick in 1584–1586. It connects to the externally drab Palazzo Giardino, which through a second portico (corridor piccolo), once connected to the castle. The statuary collection was acquired in the 16th century by Vespasiano Gonzaga [1] from antique dealers and collectors of northern Italy, as well as much of it carried away as booty by his father after the imperial Sack of Rome in 1527. [2] The hunting trophies originated from imperial collections in Prague. Much of this collection remained in the palace until 1773, when the Austrian authorities transferred them to the Palace of the Accademia di Mantova, leaving the gallery an elegant but vacant shell of its former state. In 1915 the renamed Accademia Nazionale Virgiliana ceded the collection to the comune, which has since moved it to the Palazzo Ducale of Mantua. Many pieces however, were either sold or looted in the imperial Sack of Mantua (1630) during the War of the Mantuan Succession. [3]

Interior of gallery Sabbioneta Galleria degli Antichi 3.jpg
Interior of gallery

The fresco decoration of the narrow gallery was completed in 1587 by Giovanni and Alessandro Alberti, and included some architectural trompe-l'œil . [4]

Palazzo Giardino

The Palazzo Giardino, or Casino of Sabbioneta, is an externally non-descript white building, aligned east-west and standing at the south end of the Galleria degli Antichi. The building was erected from 1580 to 1588. The exterior is now plain white stucco but at its completion, it was said to have been decorated with geometric designs. It has two formal stone entrance portals, and a sculpted cornice (1583). The interiors, however, are richly frescoed; the paintings were completed (1582–1587) by a team of painters led by Bernardino Campi. Each room has a specific dominant theme, but the entirety represents a wide sampling of classic pagan antique mythology.

Ascending via a marble staircase, one reaches the Camerino dei Cesari on the piano nobile . On the wall is Rome Triumphant with Winged Victory, flanked by two subdued stone barbarians. A peristyle has portraits of six emperors. The room is decorated with grotteschi . Depictions of Fame and a boy playing cymbals complete the room.

The next room is titled that of Baucis and Philemon. A Gonzaga coat of arms is painted in the center, flanked by two cranes and two lions, symbols respectively of vigilance and strength. The stucco frames were modeled by Giovanni Francesco Bicesi, also called Il Fornarino. The individual panels depicting scenes from the story of Philemon and Baucis in Ovid's Metamorphoses were painted by Bernardino Campi. The long walls depict the Circus Maximus and the Circus Flaminius, and between the windows is an urban perspective from a theater. In 1584, a marble fireplace was placed in the room.

In the next room, the Camera dei Miti, niches once held busts, statuary, and paintings of Gonzaga properties. The vault has gilded stucco frames by Pietro Martire Pesenti, these hold panels painted by Campi, depicting:

  1. Philyra seduced by Saturn as a horse while Cupid sleeps beneath a laurel
  2. Daedalus and Icarus
  3. Arachne and Minerva
  4. The fall of Phaeton
  5. The punishment of Marsyas

Floor tiles and marble shelves were moved in 1773 to the Palazzo Ducale in Mantua.

Across a small corridor decorated with a fresco of the myth of Orpheus, one enters the duke's studiolo . Here ovals frame depictions of the cardinal virtues with dense decoration of classical images. Campi was aided in this regard by Carlo Urbino. Another corridor, again painted with Orpheus, leads to a hall of mirrors. In the long walls are painted displays of trophies and weapons and four panels depicting the myth of Paris. In the arches of the courtyard walls were mirrors, made of Venetian glass, that served as doors of cabinets. On the shelves around the doors were busts. The bas-reliefs over the windows depict scenes of Roman life sculpted by the stucco artist Bartolomeo Conti, while the landscapes have been attributed to the Flemish painter Jan Soens.

The next room is the Camerino delle Grazie, decorated by Fornarino. The walls are richly decorated with grotteschi and mythological figures such as Apollo, the three Graces, Diana of Ephesus, and Venus with Cupid. The vault had gilded stucco frames, with a Medusa in the center. Finally, a small stairwell painted with ivy leads to a dressing room, called the Venus Room.

Little remains of the former Italian garden, visible through the windows of the hall of mirrors—only a few grottoes with niches. The central one has a marble clamshell basin. In the 16th century, the gardens had walkways sheltered by trees, and the garden facade had sculpture in its niches. [5]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Antonio da Correggio</span> Italian Renaissance painter (1489–1534)

Antonio Allegri da Correggio, usually known as just Correggio, was the foremost painter of the Parma school of the High Italian Renaissance, who was responsible for some of the most vigorous and sensuous works of the sixteenth century. In his use of dynamic composition, illusionistic perspective and dramatic foreshortening, Correggio prefigured the Baroque art of the seventeenth century and the Rococo art of the eighteenth century. He is considered a master of chiaroscuro.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Villa d'Este</span> Renaissance villa in Tivoli, Italy

The Villa d'Este is a 16th-century villa in Tivoli, near Rome, famous for its terraced hillside Italian Renaissance garden and especially for its profusion of fountains. It is now an Italian state museum, and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ca' Rezzonico</span> Palazzo and art museum in Venice, Italy

Ca' Rezzonico is a palazzo and art museum on the Grand Canal in the Dorsoduro sestiere of Venice, Italy. It is a particularly notable example of the 18th century Venetian baroque and rococo architecture and interior decoration, and displays paintings by the leading Venetian painters of the period, including Francesco Guardi and Giambattista Tiepolo. It is a public museum dedicated to 18th-century Venice and one of the 11 venues managed by the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Palazzo Vecchio</span> Town hall of Florence, Italy

The Palazzo Vecchio is the town hall of Florence, Italy. It overlooks the Piazza della Signoria, which holds a copy of Michelangelo's David statue, and the gallery of statues in the adjacent Loggia dei Lanzi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Giovanni Lanfranco</span> Italian painter (1582–1647)

Giovanni Lanfranco was an Italian painter of the Baroque period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sabbioneta</span> Comune in Lombardy, Italy

Sabbioneta is a town and comune in the province of Mantua, Lombardy region, Northern Italy. It is situated about 30 kilometres (19 mi) north of Parma, not far from the northern bank of the Po River. It was inscribed in the World Heritage List in 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ducal Palace, Mantua</span>

The Palazzo Ducale di Mantova is a group of buildings in Mantua, Lombardy, northern Italy, built between the 14th and the 17th century mainly by the noble family of Gonzaga as their royal residence in the capital of their Duchy. The buildings are connected by corridors and galleries and are enriched by inner courts and wide gardens. The complex includes some 500 rooms and occupies an area of c. 34,000 m2, which make it the sixth largest palace in Europe after the palaces of the Vatican, the Louvre Palace, the Palace of Versailles, the Royal Palace of Caserta and the Castle of Fontainebleau. It has more than 500 rooms and contains seven gardens and eight courtyards. Although most famous for Mantegna's frescos in the Camera degli Sposi, they have many other very significant architectural and painted elements.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bernardino Campi</span> Italian painter

Bernadino Campi (1522–1591) was a Renaissance painter from Cremona, who worked in Reggio Emilia. He is known as one of the teachers of Sofonisba Anguissola and of Giovanni Battista Trotti. In Cremona, his extended family owned the main artistic studios. Giulio Campi and Antonio Campi, half-brothers, were distant relatives of Bernardino; the latter is generally considered the most talented of the family. All were active and prominent painters locally. Influences on Bernardino include local Cremonese such as Camillo Boccaccino and artists from neighbouring regions such as Correggio, Parmigianino and Giulio Romano.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lorenzo Leonbruno</span> Italian painter

Lorenzo Leonbruno, also known as Lorenzo de Leombeni, was an Italian painter during the early Renaissance period. He was born in Mantua (Mantova), an Italian commune in Lombardy, Italy. Leonbruno is most well known for being commissioned by the court of Francesco Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, and his wife Isabella d'Este. The patronage continued with their eldest son Federico II Gonzaga, who was the fifth Marquis of Mantua. Leonbruno was the court painter for the Gonzaga family from 1506–24.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Camera degli Sposi</span> Frescoed room in the Ducal Palace, Mantua, Italy

The Camera degli Sposi, sometimes known as the Camera picta, is a room frescoed with illusionistic paintings by Andrea Mantegna in the Ducal Palace, Mantua, Italy. During the fifteenth century when the Camera degli Sposi was painted, Mantua was ruled by the Gonzaga, who maintained Mantua's political autonomy from its much stronger neighbors Milan and Venice by bidding their support out as a mercenary state. By commissioning Mantegna to paint the chamber, Ludovico III Gonzaga, the Marquis of Mantua, sought to give the Gonzaga rule more cultural credibility at a time when other Northern Italian courts such as the Ferrara were commissioning their own “painted chambers”.

<i>Eleven Caesars</i> Painting series by Titian

The Eleven Caesars was a series of eleven painted half-length portraits of Roman emperors made by Titian in 1536-40 for Federico II, Duke of Mantua. They were among his best-known works, inspired by the Lives of the Caesars by Suetonius. Titian's paintings were originally housed in a new room inside the Palazzo Ducale di Mantova. Bernardino Campi added a twelfth portrait in 1562.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Palazzo Grimani di Santa Maria Formosa</span>

The Palazzo Grimani of Santa Maria Formosa is a State museum, located in Venice in the Castello district, near Campo Santa Maria Formosa.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teodoro Ghisi</span> Italian painter

Teodoro Ghisi (1536–1601) was an Italian painter and engraver of the Renaissance Period, mainly active in his native Mantua. He specialized in paintings of animal and nature scenes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Farnese Collection</span> Various Greek and Roman artworks acquired by the future Pope Paul III

The classical sculptures in the Farnese Collection, one aspect of this large art collection, are one of the first collections of artistic items from Greco-Roman Antiquity. It includes some of the most influential classical works, including the sculptures that were part of the Farnese Marbles, their collection of statuary, which includes world-famous works like the Farnese Hercules, Farnese Cup, Farnese Bull and the Farnese Atlas. These statues are now displayed in the Naples National Archaeological Museum in Italy with some in the British Museum in London.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carlo Urbino</span> Italian painter

Carlo Urbino (1525/30–1585) was an Italian painter of the Renaissance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frans Geffels</span> Flemish painter

Frans Geffels, known in Italy as Francesco Geffels was a Flemish painter, printmaker, architect, stage designer and designer of ephemeral structures for solemn and festive occasions. After training in his native Antwerp, he was mainly active in Mantua, where he was prefetto delle fabbriche to the Duke, a role that gave him the direction of the artistic and construction activities undertaken by the Ducal court. He worked also on projects for the local aristocratic class of Mantua. In addition, he completed projects for the Liechtenstein princes and for the imperial court in Vienna.

Rinaldo Mantovano, also called Domenico Rinaldo, was an Italian painter from Mantua who was active between 1527 and 1539. According to Giorgio Vasari he was the most talented assistant of Giulio Romano during his stay in the service of the Gonzaga Marquis' of Mantua.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">San Paolo, Parma</span>

San Paolo is a former convent in central Parma, Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy. It is best known for housing the Camera di San Paolo, decorated by a masterpiece of fresco work (1519) by Correggio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beata Vergine Incoronata, Sabbioneta</span>

Beata Vergine Incoronata, or church of the Incoronata, is a renaissance-style, Roman Catholic church located in the town center of Sabbioneta, province of Mantua, region of Lombardy, Italy.

Sant’Antonio da Padova is a small Roman Catholic Church, located at Piazza Sant'Antonio just outside what were the medieval walls of the town of Contigliano, in the province of Rieti, region of Lazio, Italy.

References

  1. Touring Club of Italy.
  2. Encyclopedia of the History of Classical Archaeology, by Nancy Thomson de Grummond, entry on Gonzaga Family by Clifford M Brown.
  3. Encyclopedia of the History of Classical Archaeology, entry on Gonzaga Family by Clifford M Brown.
  4. Turismo Mantova [ permanent dead link ], index.
  5. Sabbioneta Commune, description of interior.

Coordinates: 44°59′51″N10°29′24″E / 44.9976°N 10.4899°E / 44.9976; 10.4899