Il Museo Civico d’Arte was established in 1962 by dividing the Civic Museum – founded in 1871 – into two sectors: archaeological-ethnological and historical-artistic. Founded after the Unification of Italy, the institute draws its primary vocation from being a place destined for the preservation of “homeland memories” and the affirmation of civic identity, and it is in this perspective that the rich complex of collections characterizing it gains full significance. It is a vast and heterogeneous heritage including: paintings, sculptures, ceramics, glass, musical instruments, scientific instruments, decorated papers, textiles, etc., largely attributable to figurative culture and local artisanal production. Many testimonies come from the donation of important private collections or sporadic gifts, to which acquisitions and recoveries have been added over time, significantly contributing to documenting the history and culture of the territory. The exhibition path unfolds in a series of rooms that have maintained the layout received at the beginning of the twentieth century, characterized by large wall showcases. Among the most significant nuclei stand out the textile collection, donated by Count Luigi Alberto Gandini, consisting of over two thousand fragments of fabrics, lace, ribbons, and embroidery dating between the twelfth and nineteenth centuries, and the Campori Gallery, donated to the Municipality of Modena in 1929, featuring paintings by Lana, Ferrari, Ceruti, Joli, Manfredi, Regnier, Crespi, Stringa, and Cerano. The sacred art room houses the large Madonna di Piazza by Begarelli, fresco fragments from the thirteenth-fourteenth centuries torn from the Cathedral, sculptures and liturgical furnishings from the twelfth-fifteenth centuries, and various paintings by Modenese authors from the sixteenth-eighteenth centuries, including Stringa, Caula, Consetti, and Zoboli, coming from the territory. Also noteworthy are the collection of scientific instruments, donated by the University Physics Cabinet and rich in devices built in the university workshop; the collection of musical instruments, donated by Luigi Francesco Valdrighi—which features notably the Harpsichord by Pietro Termanini (1741) and the brass instruments by Antonio Apparuti (first half of the nineteenth century); and the weapons collection, the result of a donation by Paolo Coccapani Imperiali. Other collections are dedicated to casts, ceramics with Emilian graffiti and specimens of Sassuola production from the thirteenth to nineteenth centuries, glass, decorated papers documenting various techniques, impressed and gilded leathers, architectural terracottas recovered from the territory, Modenese weights and measures, seals, stamps, etc. Modenese figurative culture from the nineteenth to the first half of the twentieth century is represented by works by Malatesta, Muzzioli, Cappelli, Cavazza, Bellei, Valli, and other artists trained at the Academy of Fine Arts, currently exhibited, due to lack of space, in the representative halls of the Town Hall. The Museum also includes the rich Giuseppe Graziosi Collection (Savignano sul Panaro 1879 – Florence 1942). The artist’s successful career is documented by terracottas, original plasters, bronzes, paintings, and a graphic collection—including drawings, engravings, and lithographs—displayed in the Gipsoteca located on the ground floor of the Palazzo dei Musei, while the photographic archive donated by the heirs between 1975 and 1999 is consultable online on the Museum’s website.
Information about the Civic Art Museum of Modena
Viale Vittorio Veneto, 5,
41121 Modena (Modena)
0592033100
museo.arte@comune.modena.it
https://www.comune.modena.it/museoarte
Source: MIBACT
