Pinacoteca Brera
Encyclopedia
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. It contains one of the foremost collections of Italian paintings, an outgrowth of the cultural program of the Brera Academy
Brera Academy
The Academy of Fine Arts of Brera, also known as Brera Academy is a public academic institution located in Milan, Italy. It was founded in 1776 by HIM Maria Theresa of Austria.- Overview :...
, which shares the site in the Palazzo Brera.
Verona
Verona ; German Bern, Dietrichsbern or Welschbern) is a city in the Veneto, northern Italy, with approx. 265,000 inhabitants and one of the seven chef-lieus of the region. It is the second largest city municipality in the region and the third of North-Eastern Italy. The metropolitan area of Verona...
. The convent on the site passed to the Jesuits (1572), then underwent a radical rebuilding by Francesco Maria Richini
Francesco Maria Richini
thumb|250px|The inner court of Palazzo Brera in Milan.Francesco Maria Richini was an Italian Baroque architect....
(1627–28). When the Jesuits were disbanded
Suppression of the Jesuits
The Suppression of the Jesuits in the Portuguese Empire, France, the Two Sicilies, Parma and the Spanish Empire by 1767 was a result of a series of political moves rather than a theological controversy. By the brief Dominus ac Redemptor Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Society of Jesus...
in 1773, the palazzo remained the seat of the astronomical Observatory
Observatory
An observatory is a location used for observing terrestrial or celestial events. Astronomy, climatology/meteorology, geology, oceanography and volcanology are examples of disciplines for which observatories have been constructed...
and the library founded by the Jesuits. In 1774 were added the herbarium of the new botanical garden
Botanical garden
A botanical garden The terms botanic and botanical, and garden or gardens are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word botanic is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens. is a well-tended area displaying a wide range of plants labelled with their botanical names...
. The buildings were extended to designs by Giuseppe Piermarini
Giuseppe Piermarini
Giuseppe Piermarini was an Italian architect who trained with Luigi Vanvitelli at Rome and designed the Teatro alla Scala, Milan , which remains the work by which he is remembered. Indeed, "il Piermarini" serves as an occasional euphemism for the celebrated opera house...
, who was appointed professor in the Academy when it was formally founded in 1776, with Giuseppe Parini
Giuseppe Parini
Giuseppe Parini was an Italian Enlightenment satirist and poet of the neoclassic period.-Biography:Parini was born in Bosisio in Brianza, Lombardy...
as dean. Piermarini taught at the Academy for 20 years, while he was controller of the city's urbanistic projects, like the public gardens (1787–1788) and piazza Fontana, (1780—1782).
For the better teaching of architecture, sculpture and the other arts, the Academy initiated by Parini was provided with a collection of casts after the Antique, an essential for inculcating a refined Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...
in the students. Under Parini's successors, the abate Carlo Bianconi (1778–1802) and artist Giuseppe Bossi
Giuseppe Bossi
Giuseppe Bossi was an Italian painter, arts administrator and writer on art. He ranks among the foremost figures of Neoclassical culture in Lombardy, along with Ugo Foscolo, Giuseppe Parini, Andrea Appiani or Manzoni....
(1802–1807), the Academy acquired the first paintings of its pinacoteca during the reassignment of works of Italian art that characterized the Napoleonic era
Napoleonic Era
The Napoleonic Era is a period in the history of France and Europe. It is generally classified as including the fourth and final stage of the French Revolution, the first being the National Assembly, the second being the Legislative Assembly, and the third being the Directory...
. Raphael
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...
's Sposalizio
The Marriage of the Virgin (Raphael)
The Marriage of the Virgin, also known as Lo Sposalizio, is an oil painting by Italian High Renaissance artist Raphael. Completed in 1504 for a Franciscan church in Città di Castello, the painting depicts a marriage ceremony between Mary and Joseph...
(the Marriage of the Virgin) was the key painting of the early collection, and the Academy increased its cultural scope by taking on associates across the First French Empire
First French Empire
The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...
: David
Jacques-Louis David
Jacques-Louis David was an influential French painter in the Neoclassical style, considered to be the preeminent painter of the era...
, Pietro Benvenuti
Pietro Benvenuti
Pietro Benvenuti was an Italian neoclassical painter.Born in Arezzo, he was influenced by the style of Jacques-Louis David. He was a student of the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, then studied in Rome, 1792-1803, where he formed an informal academy with his friend of long standing, Vincenzo...
, Vincenzo Camuccini
Vincenzo Camuccini
Vincenzo Camuccini was an Italian painter of Neoclassic histories and religious paintings. He was considered the premier academic painter of his time in Rome.-Biography:...
, Canova
Antonio Canova
Antonio Canova was an Italian sculptor from the Republic of Venice who became famous for his marble sculptures that delicately rendered nude flesh...
, Thorvaldsen
Bertel Thorvaldsen
Bertel Thorvaldsen was a Danish-Icelandic sculptor of international fame, who spent most of his life in Italy . Thorvaldsen was born in Copenhagen into a Danish/Icelandic family of humble means, and was accepted to the Royal Academy of Arts when he was eleven years old...
and the archaeologist Ennio Quirino Visconti
Ennio Quirino Visconti
Ennio Quirino Visconti was an Italian antiquarian and art historian, papal Prefect of Antiquities, and the leading expert of his day in the field of ancient Roman sculpture....
. In 1805, under Bossi's direction, the series of annual exhibitions was initiated with a system of prizes, a counterpart of the Paris Salon
Paris Salon
The Salon , or rarely Paris Salon , beginning in 1725 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Between 1748–1890 it was the greatest annual or biannual art event in the Western world...
s, which served to identify Milan as the cultural capital for contemporary painting in Italy through the 19th century. The Academy's artistic committee, the Commissione di Ornato exercised a controlling influence on public monuments, a precursor of today's Sopraintendenze delle Belle Arti.
Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...
witnessed the triumph of academic history painting, guided at the Academy by Francesco Hayez
Francesco Hayez
Francesco Hayez was an Italian painter, the leading artist of Romanticism in mid-19th-century Milan, renowned for his grand historical paintings, political allegories and exceptionally fine portraits.-Biography:...
, and the introduction of the landscape as an acceptable academic genre, inspired by Massimo D'Azeglio and Giuseppe Bisi, while the Academy moved towards becoming an institution for teaching the history of art. Thus in 1882 the Paintings Gallery was separated from the Academy.
From 1891 the exhibitions were reduced to triennial events, and architectural projects developed their autonomous course. During the period of the avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
when Modernism
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
was becoming established, the director of the Academy Camillo Boito
Camillo Boito
Camillo Boito was an Italian architect and engineer, and a noted art critic, art historian and novelist.-Biography:...
had as pupil Luca Beltrami
Luca Beltrami
Luca Beltrami was an Italian architect and architectural historian, known particularly for restoration projects. He was a student of Camillo Boito at the Brera Academy...
, and Cesare Tallone
Cesare Tallone
Cesare Tallone was an Italian painter.-Biography:After losing his father at the age of ten, Cesare Tallone moved with his mother and sisters to Alessandria, where he became a pupil of the decorative artist Pietro Sassi. Some members of the local bourgeoisie commissioned the first portraits from...
taught Carlo Carrà
Carlo Carrà
Carlo Carrà was an Italian painter, a leading figure of the Futurist movement that flourished in Italy during the beginning of the 20th century. In addition to his many paintings, he wrote a number of books concerning art. He taught for many years in the city of Milan.-Biography:Carrà was born in...
and Achille Funi
Achille Funi
Achille Funi was an Italian painter.-Biography:Funi studied at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts from 1906 to 1910 and joined the Nuove Tendenze movement as a painter of Cubo-Futurist works in 1914. Having enlisted in the Volunteer Cyclist Battalion and served in World War II, he became a champion of...
.
The Brera Observatory hosted the astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli
Giovanni Schiaparelli
Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli was an Italian astronomer and science historian. He studied at the University of Turin and Berlin Observatory. In 1859-1860 he worked in Pulkovo Observatory and then worked for over forty years at Brera Observatory...
for four decades, and the Orto Botanico di Brera
Orto Botanico di Brera
The Orto Botanico di Brera is a botanical garden located behind the Pinacoteca di Brera at Via Brera 28 in the center of Milan, Lombardy, Italy, and operated by the Istituto di Fisica Generale Applicata of the University of Milan...
is a historic botanical garden
Botanical garden
A botanical garden The terms botanic and botanical, and garden or gardens are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word botanic is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens. is a well-tended area displaying a wide range of plants labelled with their botanical names...
located behind the Pinacoteca.
See also
- Collections of Pinacoteca di Brera
- Aldo CarpiAldo CarpiAldo Carpi was an Italian artist, painter and writer, author of a collection of memoirs concerning his imprisonment in the infamous Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp.-Biography:...