The Treasures of Italy, masterpieces of art on display at the Villa Aurea of ​​the Archaeological Park of the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento. – Carlo Franza’s blog

Over 60 works by great artists from all 20 regions in 7 centuries of Italian art are the protagonists of the exhibition The Treasures of Italy – The great masterpieces, open until December 2025 at Villa Aurea in the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, the city designated Capital of Italian Culture for the year 2025. The exhibition, curated by Vittorio Sgarbi and Pierluigi Carofano, promoted by the Archaeological Park of Agrigento, produced by Consorzio Progetto Museo and sponsored by the Ministry of Culture, will exalt the greatness of the national artistic and cultural heritage admired throughout the world for 18 months, within one of the most prestigious cultural and archaeological sites in Italy and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The large exhibition will be divided into 3 different installations that, in rotation, will present over 60 works, including paintings and sculptures, from the most important civic, regional and national museums and from important private collections, as a testimony to a civil and cultural cohesion through the stratifications and variety of Italian art from the 15th to the 21st century, from its origins to contemporaneity.

THEThe first phase of the project, scheduled from July to November 2024, a real red-carpet in view of the 2025 celebrations of Agrigento as the capital of Italian culture, represents a historical-temporal excursus in which the protagonists are the works of: Domenico Cagini (Sicily), Pietro Cavaro (Sardinia), Nicolò dell’Arca (Puglia), Marco Cardisco (Calabria), Michele Tedesco (Basilicata), Battistello (Campania), Antonio Finelli (Molise), Perugino (Umbria), Carlo Maratti (Marche), Giacomo Balla (Lazio), Saturnino Gatti (Abruzzo), Giovan Battista Langetti (Liguria), Bernardo Strozzi (Liguria), Guido Cagnacci (Emilia-Romagna), Vitale da Bologna (Emilia-Romagna), Lippi-Botticelli (Tuscany), Bartolomeo Montagna (Veneto), Luigi Bonazza (Trentino-Alto Adige), Pierpaolo Pasolini (Friuli-Venezia Giulia), Adolf Wildt (Lombardy), Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo (Lombardy), Sodoma (Piedmont) and Italo Mus (Aosta Valley).

The works come from: Polo Museale di Salemi; National Museums of Cagliari; Cavallini Sgarbi Foundation; Pescara Museum of the Nineteenth Century Di Persio – Pallotta Foundation; Civic Art Gallery “F. Podesti” of Ancona; National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art of Rome; National Museum of Abruzzo; Museum of the City of Rovereto; National Museum of San Matteo of Pisa; Civic Museum of Viterbo; Mart of Rovereto; Bonsanti Archive Gabinetto Vieusseux; Gallerie dell’Accademia Venezia; Regional Museum of Castello Gamba of the Aosta Valley.

The exhibition was conceived to be the narrative linchpin of Agrigento Capital of Culture 2025 and also aims to highlight the virtuous relationship of the Italian cultural system, which involves and enhances the relationship with the private system. Overall, therefore, the exhibition will be a story of authors, historical phases, large and small museums, historical collections and territorial systems. The philosophy of the project will then find full realization in the crucial phase of 2025, with the exhibition of works collected thanks to the collaboration between the Regional Department of Cultural Heritage and Sicilian Identity and the General Directorate of Museums of the Ministry of Culture, on the basis of a Memorandum of Understanding signed between the parties. The twenty Presidents of the Region will instead make up the Honorary Committee of the Exhibition, thus creating an unprecedented institutional table.

The Treasures of Italy – Masterpieces of Art enjoys the patronage of: Ministry of Culture; Sicilian Region Department of Cultural Heritage and Sicilian Identity; Valley of the Temples Park of Agrigento; City of Agrigento.

Carlo Franza