From May 14th to September 25th, the Bailo Museum hosts the major exhibition “Canova Glory of Treviso: from Classical Beauty to Romantic Announcement”, curated by Fabrizio Malachin, Giuseppe Pavanello and Nico Stringa. An exhibition that presents Canova and the beauty of antiquity, but also Canova as an extraordinary herald of contemporary romanticism. Friday May 13th the ribbon cutting in the presence of Mayor Mario Conte. The exhibition is open from Saturday and the first weekend the entrance ticket is free for all residents of Treviso and its province. “I couldn’t wait to open the doors of the Grande Bailo to the city of Treviso and all its citizens,” the mayor commented, visibly moved.
The exhibition
The exhibition reconstructs the environment planned by Canova in Palazzo Papafava, where the ancient/modern comparison is brought to its maximum essence: Apollo des Belvedere compared to the triumphant Perseus and the Gladiator Borghese, another famous work, compared to the Creugante. It is the “perfect theorem”. For the first time, the works are also being exhibited on their original plinths, which were restored for the occasion. Several Canova themes are on display: from heroic sculptures with the unpublished plaster of the horse of preparation of the famous group The Theseus fighting with the Centaur of Vienna, to the romantic modern with meditations on the tormented female figure (we are in the field of Maddalene ) and the kind and loving groups (Cupid and Psyche). And again the portraits, the engravings, the canovan celebrations, the photography: a path full of more than 150 works developed in 11 sections. The great Treviso sculptor will be the protagonist of the exhibition, but the civic heritage will not be neglected. Not only the Nineteenth Century Gallery, but also several unpublished works by Canova reappeared during the preparation of the exhibition, including a bust with Antonio D’Este’s portrait of Antonio Canova. And real relics again, the cast of the hand and the artist’s death mask. A corpus of unpublished letters and the large book of 86 Canovan engravings given to Treviso in 1837 by his brother Giambattista Sartori Canova. Alongside this are a number of Canova materials that seldom came out of the secret rooms of the City Museums to be shown. Among them the precious sketch of the Three Graces, where on closer inspection one could discover the footprints of the Master.
The natural continuation of the exhibition is the Galleria dell’800, which presents works of great interest in a new framework that enhances the civic heritage, but with a strong focus on new trends and multimedia, without abandoning the fundamental scientific bases. The great retrospective on “Canova Gloria Trevigiana” presents the area of the new Bailo Museum entirely dedicated to the nineteenth century: it is a physiological passage that leads to the discovery of art in Treviso and Veneto, starting with the years that characterized by the exceptional light were designed by the sculptor for unraveling throughout the century. In this section we find, among other well-known artists and works, “revealed” by this new exhibition and hitherto relegated to the deposits by the narrowness of the exhibition spaces of the “old” Bailo. The unveiled journey into the 19th century begins with the sumptuous portraits of two of the ‘founding fathers’ of the Municipal Art Gallery: she is Margherita Prati Grimaldi in the bright painting by Andrea Appiani. In the portrait by Natale Schiavoni he is Sante Giacomelli. The noblewoman associated in 1851 with the Municipality of Treviso a nucleus of paintings that would form the first nucleus of the municipal art gallery, while the second was associated in 1874 with the newly founded art gallery, which included up to 54 works, then mainly “contemporary” , which form the main core of the 19th Century Gallery. Also on view is Francesco Hayez’s “Family Group”, depicting the painter at the age of 16: the artist’s first known work. To further enrich the proposal of the new gallery Canova del Bailo, two important pluses. First of all, almost an “exhibition within an exhibition”, a selection of 30 exceptional Canova art shots by the photographer Fabio Zonta: 30 large-format photographs to give shape to a monograph. The photographer’s interpretive “lens” emphasizes the three-dimensionality of the work, accentuates details, subjects, expressiveness. A surprise to be discovered is Anderson Tegon’s creative intervention with Pepper’s Ghost: an immersive video multimedia show in the gallery. An offer of articulated proposals that indicate the line that will characterize the Nuovo Bailo as a place of contamination between the arts, faithful to the mission of enhancing the civic heritage but with a strong focus on new trends and multimedia, without that essential abandon fundamentals scientifically.
info and maps
Full ticket: 9 euros
Reduced ticket (over 65, groups, congresses): 6 euros
Free: students, under 18, group leaders
Cumulative Canova Exhibition / Santa Caterina Museum: full 13 euros; 9 euros reduced