| Museums in Genoa

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Titolo dell'opera:

Botta corset

Ambito culturale:

ambito italiano

Autore:

Anonymous

Object Type:

corset

Epoca:

Inventario:

2957

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 45; Larghezza: 35

Tecnica:

acciaio- incisione

Ultimi prestiti:

ex museid

Back to Focus:

Ground floor

Descrizione:

The corselet is a type of armour, notably lighter than ordinary armour and usually without shoulder straps or hips, which protected mainly the chest and belly, in use until the 17th century. Most of the pieces of armour preserved in the Musei del Mare di Genova were intended for the personal defence of soldiers embarked on the galleys of the Republic. Lightness and strength were required of them: they had to withstand the blow of an arquebus, the strike of a lance or the arrow of a crossbow. The equipment was reduced to a minimum: the breastplate and the dorsal, bound on the shoulders by leather laces and held together by a wide leather belt. To protect the head, the morion or borgognotta.

Foto di The Submarine S 518 Nazario Sauro

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Author/ School/ Dating:

The Submarine "Nazario Sauro S 518"

Object Type:

Museum section

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The Submarine "Nazario Sauro S 518"

Descrizione:

As of today, the "Nazario Sauro S518" is the only Italian submarine that can be visited on the water. It was built in 1976 by Fincantieri for the Italian Navy and was decommissioned in 2002. The sound of crew voices, engines, sonars, radars and torpedo launchers accompany the visitor in an exciting experience.

A huge outcome was achieved during the summer of 2022: the renovation of the submarine that, 13 years after its inauguration, needed a considerable restyling. After a round-trip from the dockyard of La Spezia, thanks to the involvement of several institutions supervised by the Mu.MA Institution, the Nazario Sauro came back to the dock in front of the Galata Museo del Mare, ready to welcome many new guests.

In addition to the visit of the submarine, visitors can learn more about living on board in a small environment, maneuvering and piloting through several multimedia activities available inside the museum.

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Author/ School/ Dating:

Model of a Galley 1622

Object Type:

Room

Back to Focus:

Ground floor

Descrizione:

The purpose of the “New Arches” which are still visible in the building (later called the Galata District) was to perform the fitting of galleys or to remove vessels from the water for repair. The ground floor of the Museum houses a full size reconstruction of a galley dating from1622. It is possible to board the galley hrough the access ladder and as a “crew member”, the visitor is called by one of the shipbuilders to clarify his identity - slave, forced worker or paid labourer? - and is free to explore the cramped interior which is full of goods and equipment.

Foto di Simon Vouet "David with the head of Goliath"

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Titolo dell'opera:

David with the head of Goliath

Acquisizione:

Giovanni Battista Cambiaso 1923 Genova - acquisto

Autore:

Vouet, Simon

Object Type:

painting

Epoca:

1620 - 1622 - XVII

Inventario:

PB 2201

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 121; Larghezza: 94

Tecnica:

olio su tela

Ultimi prestiti:

Utrecht, Caravaggio e l'Europa - Utrecht, Central Museum - 14/12/2018 a 24/03/2019
L'ultimo Caravaggio. Eredi e nuovi maestri - Milano, Gallerie d'Italia - 30/11/2017 - 08/04/2018
CARAVAGGIO and His Time Friends, Rivals and Enemies - Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art - 01/03/2016 - 12/06/2016
Caravaggio y los peintores del Norte - Madrid - 2016
Caravaggio and his follower in Rome - Fort Worth, Texas, Kimbell Art Museum - 21/10/2011 - 05/02/2012
Simon Vouet - Nantes- Besançon - 2009
Van Dyck a Genova. Grande pittura e collezionismo - Genova - 1997
Vouet - Parigi - 1991
Valentin - Parigi - 1974

Back to Focus:

David with the head of Goliath

Descrizione:

Simon Vouet, French “Caravaggist” painter, must have painted this beautiful canvas between 1620 and 1622, the years in which his stay in Genoa is recorded and probably more specifically, during the summer of 1621, when he was a guest in the villa of Sampierdarena of the brothers Marcantonio and Gio. Carlo Doria. They were among the most prominent figures of the city both from a financial point of view and also in terms of patronage of the arts. Vouet painted various works, including in all probability, this David with the head of Goliath which, twinned with a Giuditta (still in a private collection), was then transferred to the town residence of Gio. Carlo in Vico del Gelsomino, now Via David Chiossone. The inventory of the Doria, and the documents relating to the subsequent hereditary passages of the family assets, gives us a glimpse of a collection of extraordinary works of art: Gio. Carlo also owned a Saint Catherine by Vouet , today in a private collection, a San Sebastiano being treated by a group of pious women, today in the Condorelli collection, and a Portrait of his client, now in the Louvre. The painting depicts David holding the head of Goliath, showing a moment when the boy, turning his gaze to a point outside the painting, and holding the giant's huge head in his left hand, seems to reflect on the enormity of his achievement, accomplished with the help of God. The refined colour combinations, the impalpable movement suggested by the use of light, the introspective air, the realism, the rigorous compositional choices are a severe reinterpretation of Caravaggio, so much so that this David was called "la plus caravagesque de toutes ses oeuvres connues". As in the best works of Merisi, the other protagonist of the composition is light. From outside the frame, it bathes almost the entire figure of David, who appears, almost taken unawares by this aurora and turning his gaze towards the light, his movement is frozen in an ecstatic pose, his lips parted, almost as if in the grip of a divine vision. The work passed to the Cambiaso family in the 18th century, and was purchased for Palazzo Bianco in 1923. The painting depicts David holding Goliath's head.

Foto di Anthony Van Dyck "Paolina Adorno-Brignole-Sale"

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Titolo dell'opera:

Portrait of Paolina Adorno Brignole-Sale

Acquisizione:

Maria Brignole-Sale De Ferrari 1874 Genova - donazione

Autore:

Van Dyck, Antoon

Object Type:

painting

Epoca:

1627 - 1627 - XVII

Inventario:

PR 51

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 286; Larghezza: 198

Tecnica:

olio su tela

Ultimi prestiti:

Cento opere di Van Dick - Genova - 1955
Van Dyck a Genova. Grande pittura e collezionismo. - Genova - 1997
Van Dyck - Anversa - 1999

Back to Focus:

Anthony Van Dyck

Descrizione:

The portrait of Anton Giulio Brignole-Sale, together with that of his wife Paolina Adorno, constitute one of the rare examples of en pendant portraits by Van Dyck that still remain together. They are also the only ones among the fifty from Van Dyck's Genoese period for which the specific payment recorded in the account books of the Brignole-Sale family in 1627 is preserved: with a third painting, depicting Geronima Sale Brignole with her daughter Aurelia, his mother and sister respectively, a total of 747 lire was paid to the painter in 1627-the final year of his Genoese sojourn. These are probably the last paintings executed by the Flemish artist in Genoa, the city where he arrived in 1621 as Rubens' “best disciple,” soon enjoying extraordinary success with the new city nobility, who, well aware of the even symbolic value of the images and the celebratory message they conveyed, competed to be portrayed by the young artist. They have always belonged to the family picture gallery and are the only ones to have remained in the residence of the family for whom they were painted. Ridolfo, son of the effigy couple, brought them to the Brignole-Sale family's new residence, Palazzo Rosso, after the mid-seventeenth century, where they remain today. In 1687 they were bought back by the cadet Gio. Francesco I, at a time when, his brother having died without male descendants, they would have ended up in foreign hands. The portrait of Paolina Adorno is the largest of the work by Van Dyck during his years in Genoa depicting a single female figure and follows a compositional scheme frequenty adopted by the artist during his career. In it appears, almost as a sort of compendium, all of typical stylistic features of his work: the presentation of a figure in both full and three-quarter length; the gaze turned towards the viewer; the setting in a space characterized by imposing columns, loggias and sumptuous red drapes; the presence of animals and, above all, magnificent attire such as the dress in which Paolina is depicted,rendered mimetically with a subtle blue colour to depict the fabric and with a more robust material, in yellow and white paste, to evoke the gold of the embroidery. Here Paolina is portrayed in her twenties, at the very height of her youth, but in the composition there is no lack of elements which, in addition to the merely decorative role, also contribute an allegorical element, for example looking at the parrot – a detail in which the collaboration of Jan Roos has been suggested – the bird’s feathers have fallen on the pillow, while the open rose, in the lady’s right hand is in full bloom. Both represent the transience of beauty which, like the rose, is destined to fade.

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Titolo dell'opera:

The cook

Acquisizione:

Maria Brignole-Sale De Ferrari 1874 Genova - donazione

Autore:

Strozzi, Bernardo

Object Type:

painting

Epoca:

1625 - 1625 - XVII

Inventario:

PR 20

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 176; Larghezza: 185

Tecnica:

olio su tela

Ultimi prestiti:

Pittori genovesi a Genova nel '600 e nel '700 - Genova - 1969
Bernardo Strozzi - Genova - 1995
La cucina italiana. Cuoche a confronto - Genova - 2015

Back to Focus:

Bernardo Strozzi

Descrizione:

Certainly one of the best-known works in the Strada Nuova Museums and in 17th-century Genoese painting itself, this canvas, internationally known as Strozzi's “La cuoca” (The Cook), depicts a kitchen maid plucking a goose among chickens and pigeons, with a turkey hanging behind her, in the kitchen of a 17th-century Genoese aristocratic residence. In fact, among local noble families at the time, the profession of cook was reserved exclusively for men, while women could only perform more menial tasks, such as plucking poultry. That this is an aristocratic residence is certain, given the presence in the foreground of a rich embossed silver basin with an elaborate handle depicting a female bust. The painting is mentioned for the first time in the 1683-84 inventory of Gio. Francesco I Brignole Sale, who commissioned the Palazzo Rosso residence. From the second decade of the 18th century, however, and at least until 1774, the work is always mentioned in inventories and guides in the family villa on the hill of Albaro (now the Marcelline Institute). it is very likely that this less prestigious location was motivated by the everyday subject matter of the painting, which was probably considered unsuitable for the decorum of the city palace, whose picture gallery had been enriched between the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century with paintings of historical subjects or sacred iconography. The work by Strozzi - referred to in documents of the time as “il Cappuccino” because he entered the Order as a friar at the age of seventeen - is an admirable synthesis of the various influences that made up the fabric of local painting in the early decades of the 17th century: on the one hand, the Flemish fashion for depictions of “kitchens”, “markets” and “pantries”, which had already found examples in the mid-16th century in paintings by artists such as Aertsen and Beuckelaer, documented in the collections of Genoese families (two panels by these artists are now in Palazzo Bianco); on the other hand, the new attention to the genre of “still life”, due to the presence in the city of painters, still coming from Flanders, such as Jan Roos and Giacomo Liegi; finally, the first emergence of Caravaggio-inspired naturalism, which constituted the other pole of renewal in the local school. This canvas, dating from around 1625, is an example of the painter's best qualities: textured brushwork, “tasteful and suave...manipulation of colours”, “rich and robust colours”, as the sources write. From an iconographic point of view, there is a clear desire to measure oneself against the representation of popular subjects, showing an adherence to reality still unknown to Genoese painters, and singular if we consider this choice on the part of a religious figure; however, it cannot be ruled out that beyond this immediate meaning, other symbolic contents may be hidden in the painting, perhaps - as has been suggested - an allegory of the four elements, alluded to by the birds for “air”, the elaborate stagnara for “water”, the “cook” for “earth”, and “fire”, which the painter depicts with great skill crackling under the pot. Boccardo (La cucina italiana. Cuoche a confronto, 2015) hypothesises that the work was commissioned by Gio. Carlo Doria at the end of 1625; when the commissioner died that same year, the canvas then entered the Brignole-Sale collections. The painting depicts a cook plucking some animals.

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Titolo dell'opera:

Il Cannone

Acquisizione:

Paganini, Niccolò 04/07/1851 Genova - legato

Autore:

Guarnieri, Bartolomeo Giuseppe detto del Gesù

Object Type:

violin

Epoca:

1743 - 1743 - XVIII

Inventario:

PB820

Misure:

Unità di misura: mm; Varie: misura laterale diapason: 198; Unità di misura: mm; Larghezza: 206; Lunghezza: 353; Varie: parte inferiore; Unità di misura: mm; Larghezza: 111; Varie: parte centrale; Unità di misura: mm; Larghezza: 167; Varie: parte superiore

Tecnica:

legno intagliato

Ultimi prestiti:

Paganini Rockstar - Palazzo Ducale, Genova - 19/10/2018 - 10/03/2019

Back to Focus:

Paganini Rooms

Descrizione:

A specially set up room in Palazzo Tursi is dedicated to Niccolò Paganini (1782-1840), since the celebrated Genoese violinist and composer by will wished to bequeath to his hometown “so that it may be perpetually preserved” his favorite instrument, what he had nicknamed “my violin cannon” because of the fullness of its sound, while other heirlooms of the artist have been added over time through the generosity of heirs or by other means. The Cannone, built in Cremona in 1743 by luthier Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarneri, known as “del Gesù” because of the cross traced next to his signature on the musical instruments he made, was probably given to Paganini in 1802, in Livorno, Italy, and immediately became an exceptional partner for the virtuosities of the musician who, thanks in part to the extraordinary extension of the fingers of his left hand, developed new violin techniques by exploiting the full potential of that instrument. When Paganini had to have it repaired by the Parisian luthier Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume (1798 -1875) in 1833, the latter also made a copy, which he gave to the musician, who in turn, seven years later, made a gift of it to his best pupil, the Genoese Camillo Sivori (1815 -1894) who, emulating the master, bequeathed it to the City of Genoa upon his death (it is also on display in the same room). However, the Cannon is intact in its main parts, and the varnish is still the original one so much so that, at the end of the soundboard, it bears the mark of Paganini's use since, like all his contemporaries, he played without using the chin rest, that is, resting his chin directly on the instrument. In addition to distinguished violinists, playing the Cannon is the responsibility of the winner of the 'Paganini Prize' International Violin Competition. In addition to the two violins mentioned above, the room also displays one of Paganini's music stands, some of his autographs, a chessboard of him and its pawns, his effigies and other mementos. Two-piece top in medium-grained fir wood, fairly regular. Two-piece back in maple wood. Maple wood sides. Red-orange varnish, tending towards brown.

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Titolo dell'opera:

Cleopatra dying

Acquisizione:

Brignole-Sale De Ferrari Maria 1874 Genova - donazione

Ambito culturale:

ambito emiliano

Autore:

Barbieri, Giovanni Francesco detto il Guercino

Object Type:

painting

Epoca:

1648 - 1648 - XVII

Inventario:

PR 16

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 173; Larghezza: 237

Tecnica:

olio su tela

Ultimi prestiti:

Il Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, 1591-1666) - Bologna - 1968
Genova e Guercino. Dipinti e disegni delle civiche collezioni - Genova - 1992
El siglo de los genoveses e una lunga storia di arte e splendore nel palazzo dei dogi - Genova - 1999/2000
Guercino tra Sacro e Profano - Piacenza - 2017

Back to Focus:

Emilian School

Descrizione:

This painting, in which Cleopatra is depicted in the act of taking her life, in order not to suffer the shame of defeat and imprisonment. The painting was executed by the master in the last phase of his activity, when he had moved to Bologna following the death of Guido Reni (1642), when he inherited the role of head of the school and underwent its influence, moving towards a classicist style, aimed at a greater idealization of the figures accompanied by a progressive reduction of the chromatic range and the frequent use of pastel colours. The canvas is a fine example of this renewed stylistic direction, skilfully playing in only two tones: the white of the sheets and the complexion of Cleopatra and the purple of the cushions, the curtains of the alcove, arranged in a “wall”, as though in a theatrical performance, and the ruby-coloured blood drops that flow from the breast of the queen, who, by now near lifeless, lies languidly on the couch. The painting is identifiable as that mentioned in Guercino’s account books as "painting of Cleopatra" paid 125 ducats "March 24, 1648 by the most illustrious Mons. Carlo Emanuele Durazzi", cousin of Stefano Durazzo. He, as was tradition for many Genoese cardinals, held the position of cardinal for the Emilia region, which was subject to the Papal State. This link - if the legate was not Genoese, then the vicelegate probably was - explains the great wealth of seventeenth century Emilian painting in the collections of the Ligurian city. By the mid-eighteenth century, through various hereditary passages, the painting passed from the Durazzo family into the collection of Gio. Francesco II Brignole - Sale, who placed it in the picture gallery on the second noble floor of Palazzo Rosso. The modalities of the transfer of ownership from the heirs of Carlo Emanuele II Durazzo, for whom the work was executed, to the picture gallery of Gio. Francesco II Brignole-Sale at Palazzo Rosso, where it appeared as early as the 1756 catalog, have not yet been clarified. Careful restoration in 1991 restored the work to its highly refined yet limited color scheme. Drawings in relation to this painting are noteworthy: the one interrogatively attributed to Guercino preserved in Besancon (inv. N. D. 2266), in pen and ink, shows the queen lying on her side, her head resting on the left and in the right-hand side-with greater respect for the literary source-the asp: if it is to be referred to the work at Palazzo Rosso, it is an early study. More interesting are the other two sheets, the one from the P. E n de Boer collection in Amsterdam, in pen and ink, and the one from a private U.S. collection. In the Dutch drawing, the bust of Cleopatra in particular appears to be defined, while it does not seem that the artist intended to depict her completely lying down. This detail is, however, evident in the American drawing, where the tasseled pillow and curtains also appear. The painting depicts Cleopatra dying on a bed while being bitten by a snake.

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Titolo dell'opera:

Already Venus and Mars / Allegory of Intemperance

Acquisizione:

Brignole-Sale De Ferrari Maria 1889 Genova - legato

Autore:

Rubens, Pieter Paul

Object Type:

painting

Epoca:

1632 - 1635 - XVII

Inventario:

PB 160

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 133; Larghezza: 142

Tecnica:

olio su tavole di rovere

Ultimi prestiti:

Mostra d'Arte Antica - Genova - 1982
Pieter Paul Rubens. Kritischer Katalog der Zeichnungen - Berlino - 1990
Rubens - Lille - 2003

Back to Focus:

Flemish School

Descrizione:

The painting is presented as an allegory, in which traditionally have been recognized the figures of Love disarming Mars, god of war, who, astonished, surrenders to the prococious charms of Venus and the intoxication caused by the wine contained in the silver flask and cup, offered to him by Bacchus, the god of the joy of life. Venus wears coeval clothes, her face and her curvy physiognomy reflect canons of beauty common in Rubens's production and do not belong, as the inventories of the Brignole - Sale house wanted, to the painter's second wife. Mars, on the other hand, wears the typical attire of the lansquenet and is not a self-portrait of the artist, as the aforementioned inventories estimated, but reproduces the face, identical even in expression, of a member of the Van den Wijngaerd family, which Rubens portrayed at least two other times. The Fury that bursts, on the right, from the shadows of a landscape that, on the left, is revealed to be desolate, burned and ravaged by war, has been realized with vibrant essential touches of brown and black directly on the reddish-brown preparation and contrasts with the sensuous chromatic intensity and intact luminosity of the impasti of the figures in the foreground, of Titianesque ancestry. Recently the subject has been interpreted more generically as an Allegory of Intemperance, rejecting the identification of the two protagonists as the god of War and the goddess of Love. , A masterpiece of the Flemish artist's late maturity, datable between 1632 and 1635, the panel is first mentioned in Genoa in about 1735, when it was reported to have belonged to Gio. Francesco II Brignole - Sale in the Palazzo Rosso; according to a recent investigation, however, the painting would have come to the city from Madrid about thirty years earlier, probably through Francesco de Mari. The vicissitudes of the work in the following thirty years until 1735 are still unknown.

Foto di Gerard David "Polittico della Cervara"

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Titolo dell'opera:

Cervara Polyptych - The Madonna and Child with Saints Jerome and Benedict

Ambito culturale:

ambito fiammingo

Autore:

David, Gerard

Object Type:

polyptych

Epoca:

1506 - 1510 - XVI

Inventario:

PB 176

Misure:

Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 152,5; Larghezza: 64; Varie: Tavola con San Benedetto; Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 152,5; Larghezza: 64; Varie: Tavola con San Gerolamo; Unità di misura: cm; Altezza: 153; Larghezza: 89; Varie: Tavola della Madonna col Bambino

Tecnica:

olio su tavola di rovere

Ultimi prestiti:

Mostra della pittura antica in Liguria - Genova - 1946
Il Polittico della Cervara di Gerard David - Genova - 2006

Back to Focus:

Flemish School

Descrizione:

The polyptych comes from the Benedictine abbey of San Gerolamo della Cervara (Santa Margherita Ligure- GE) and was commissioned to Gerard David by Vincenzo Sauli to be placed at the entrance to the choir of the monastic church. Of the seven panels that made up the polyptych at Palazzo Bianco, the three main compartments depicting the Madonna and Child, known as the “Madonna of the Grapes,” St. Jerome and St. Benedict, as well as the upper crowning of the central panel, depicting the Crucifixion, are on display. The missing parts are now in the Metropolitan Museum (Announcing Angel and Announcing Madonna) and the Louvre (lunette with the Blessing Father). An inscription, known from a 1790 account, ran under the base of the Virgin's throne and read, “Hoc opus fecit fieri D.nus Vincentius Saulus MCCCCCVI die VII septembris” [cf. G. Spinola, Memorie storiche del Monistero..., 18th century, c. 596]. The three compartments compose a unified space, made continuous by the foreshortening of the floor, the architectural structure of the throne, and the “millefiori” tapestry that serves as a background for the Virgin and the figures of the two saints. This type of tapestry was believed to be a metaphor for Paradise, populated by the different categories of the elect - roses allude to the martyrs, violets to the confessors, lilies to the virgins - and helps to connote as heavenly the space that welcomes the holy figures. In the center, seated on a throne, Mary holds Jesus and helps him pluck a grape from a bunch of grapes, alluding to the sacrifice of the cross and the Eucharistic wine salvation. The gemstone shining in the Virgin's forehead, attached to a strip of precious fabric on which the incipit of the Ave Maria is embroidered, alludes to the words of the Psalmist: “royal Virgin, adorned with the gems of many virtues, radiant with the splendor of spirit and body,” while Mary's royalty, which comes to her from belonging to the bloodline of David and from being the mother and bride of the King of Heaven, is reaffirmed by the verses of the Salve Regina, embroidered in gold letters along the hem of the mantle. The triptych depicts the Madonna and Child, known as the ‘Madonna of the Grapes’, St. Jerome and St. Benedict, as well as the upper crown of the central panel, depicting the Crucifixion.

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