The Ricci Oddi Gallery was inaugurated in 1931, in the spaces of the former San Siro Convent, converted into a museum by architect Giulio Ulisse Arata. The public enjoyment of Giuseppe Ricci Oddi’s collection took a long and difficult time, precisely because the Municipality wanted to fulfill the wishes of the Piacenza philanthropist who intended to donate his city a collection of artistic significance with public utility. The art collection, contemporary to him, for Giuseppe Ricci Oddi (1868-1937) began in 1897 with a taste aimed both at Piacenzan expressions and at the various Italian researches of the second half of the 19th century, without ever getting too close to the most radical avant-gardes and with attention directed towards some moderate early 20th-century innovations, such as the stylistic nuances of Symbolism and the Impressionist and Fauve experiences developed by the most up-to-date Italians. Following the death of the philanthropist, the Gallery continued to expand 20th-century art and, after a significant restoration from 1997 to 2001, the collections are presented to the public in a new layout providing different spaces more suited to modern museum needs: an underground room and a whole floor for education.
Stefano Fugazza, director until 2009, conceived the new museum layout organizing it by rooms: the main hall is used for temporary exhibitions or new acquisitions, rooms are harmoniously arranged with works by artists grouped by their geographic proximity, stylistic affinities, and chronological consistency, particularly showcasing 19th-century and early 20th-century figurative research. The 20th century opens with works by Emilian artists like Amedeo Bocchi, Giuseppe Graziosi, Garzia Fioresi, Alfredo Protti, Giovanni Boldini, alongside the Italo-French research of Mario Cavaglieri; followed by works of Piacentini Luigi Arrigoni, Alfredo Soressi, Luciano Richetti, and Bruno Cassinari, as well as sculptures by Medardo Rosso, Domenico Trentecoste, Libero Andreotti, Ermenegildo Luppi, Attilio Selva, Pietro Canonica, Quirino Ruggeri, Alessandro Moretti, and Arturo Dazzi. Venetian 20th-century figurative culture is represented by Pietro Fragiacomo, Guglielmo and Beppe Ciardi, Francesco Sartorelli, Ettore Tito, Ferruccio Scattola, Guido Cadorin, and Lino Selvatico; Roman pictorial research is testified by Antonio Mancini, while the South features interesting works by Vincenzo Irolli. A transitional movement between past and future, around the turn of the century, was Symbolism, where clear signs of the cultural renewal later exploding in the birth of European avant-gardes can be recognized. Figuratively, it is represented by important works of Giulio Aristide Sartorio, Plinio Nomellini, Camillo Innocenti, and Felice Carena, as well as interesting paintings from the Emilia-Romagna school such as Adolfo De Carolis, Mario De Maria, Cesare Laurenti. Attendance at the Biennials during the first thirty years of the last century brought collector Ricci Oddi to knowledge and appreciation of international art, especially that which had made significant changes to Italian art: works by Thorolf Holmboe, Alfred Napoléon Delaunois, Carl Larsson, and Albin Egger-Lienz were acquired by him. The vast season of the Italian Novecento art movement, with many of its variants, is pictorially represented by Piero Marussig, Gianfilippo Usellini, Massimo Campigli, Ottavio Steffenini, Carlo Prada, Filippo De Pisis, Bruno Saetti, Anselmo Bucci, Leonardo Dudreville, Achille Funi, Gian Emilio Malerba, Ubaldo Oppi, Mario Sironi, Felice Carena, Felice Casorati, Arturo Tosi, Aldo Carpi, Carlo Carrà, Alberto Salietti, Michele Cascella; sculptural works by Adolfo Wildt, Francesco Messina, Umberto Boccioni, and Siro Penagini are also present. As for contemporary art collections, the second half of the 20th century is primarily documented by Piacentine painting, sculpture, and graphics, with works by Bruno Cassinari, Gustavo Foppiani, Ludovico Mosconi, Armodio (Vilmore Schenardi), Carlo Bertè, Bruno Grassi, Alfredo Casali, Franco Corradini, Giancarlo Braghieri, Mauro Fornari, Giacomo Malfanti, Bruno Sapiente, Bruno Missieri, Secondo Tizzoni, Giorgi Groppi, Paolo Perotti, Sergio Brizzolesi, Giuseppe Serafini, and Alfredo Sorresi, Ettore Bonfatti Sabbioni; and by two nuclei of works, the Cogni donation of Lorenzo Pepe sculptures and the paintings of Giancarlo Manara, which enrich the Gallery, again meeting its natural vocation as a collection of contemporary Italian art. Also not to be forgotten are examples of Pavia painting by Contardo Barbieri and Alfredo Mantica, as well as Emiliani Nando Negri, Pietro Ghizzardi, Giuseppe Motti, and Carlo Mattioli. The Gallery’s activity is aimed at acquiring contemporary artistic realities linked to the territory, as well as their promotion through exhibitions, restorations, lectures, readings, educational activities, publications, and promotional initiatives. Among the latest events are the exhibitions Piacentine Sculpture of the Early 20th Century (2002), Piacentine Painting of the 20th Century (2002), the donation by Piacenza poet Ferdinando Cogni Sculptures by Lorenzo Pepe (2002), Eyes on Art. Twenty-two Contemporary Piacentine Artists (2002); The Very Small Gallery. Women Artists at the Ricci Oddi (2003); in 2004, The Revolt and the Enchantment. Poetry, Painting and Sculpture in Nello Vegezzi, Venus’ Mirror. Sybille and the City, and Luciano Ricchetti at the first edition of the Cremona Prize (1939), The Woman in Boccioni’s Graphics, The Revolt and the Enchantment. Poetry, Painting and Sculpture in Nello Vegezzi. The following year Stefano Fugazza organized the photographic exhibition Seeing the Invisible and the exhibition of the Mancini collection composed of small format works titled Fifteen by Fifteen. In 2006, Angels, Devils, Queens. Gustavo Foppiani Graphic Artist was inaugurated, while at the Palazzo del Podestà in Castell’ Arquato the retrospective Tribute to Umberto Mastroianni was held. Also remembered are the monographic exhibitions on Francesco Dossena, Renato Natali, Romano Tagliaferri, and at the Gallery’s main hall, that on Aldo Brizzi The Neorealism and Beyond. 2008 was the year of “Rainer Maria Rilke. The Poet and His Angels,” an exhibition accompanied by a related program of meetings. The Ricci Oddi’s activity program also includes lectures, cultural meetings, presentations of works, and guided tours, including cycles such as Reading Art and Writing Art, as well as meetings with artists Maurizio Bottarelli and Armodio complementing the exhibition The Soul of the Twentieth Century. In 2010 exhibitions “Alfredo Tansini Painter and Photography. Materials for a Rediscovered Artist” and “Bitter Chalice. Female Figures Between the 19th and 20th Century in the Works of the Ricci Oddi” were organized. From 2011 are the solo exhibition “Stefano Bruzzi, the Poetics of Snow” and the study day titled “The Eighty Years of the Ricci Oddi. A Modern Art Gallery in 1930s Italy,” on the occasion of the Gallery’s eightieth anniversary.
Information on Ricci Oddi Modern Art Gallery
Via San Siro 13,
29121 Piacenza (Piacenza)
0523320742
[email protected]
https://www.riccioddi.it
Every day 9:30-12:30; 15:00-18:00
Source: MIBACT
