The Cornaro complex is one of the most important artistic expressions of the sixteenth-century Padua. Arrived in 1968 by testamentary bequest to the Municipality of Padua from Countess Giulia Giusti del Giardino, born Bianchini d’Alberigo, it is part of the civic museum system. The Loggia and the Odeo Cornaro are what remains of a larger complex of buildings and gardens, among the greatest testimonies of Padua’s Renaissance and an expression of the cultural interests of its creator: Alvise Cornaro (Venice, 1480/84 – Padua, 1566). A scholar of hydraulics and agricultural entrepreneur, Cornaro was a theorist of architecture, promoter of the figurative arts, and patron of the artists called to work in his “court,” a privileged meeting place of the most illustrious protagonists of the city’s intellectual life. The Loggia, dated 1524, was built based on a design by the Veronese architect Giovanni Maria Falconetto, linked to Cornaro by friendship and by a shared interest in classical antiquity. Specifically designed for theatrical performances following the growing humanistic interest in ancient theater, it constitutes the first concrete realization in the Venetian territory of the frons scenae of the Roman era, that is, the stage with a portico on a raised base, marked by arches and composite pillars, adorned with friezes and closed by a representative backdrop.
Information on Loggia and Odeo Cornaro
Via Cesarotti, 37
35100 Padua (Padua)
https://padovacultura.padovanet.it/homepage-6.0/2004/03/loggia_e_odeo_cornaro_2.html
Source: MIBACT
