Casa Dante, a new space on the Supreme Poet, opens in Ravenna: collaboration between the city and the Uffizi

On Sunday, September 19, a new space for culture opens in Ravenna: it is Casa Dante, a complementary project to the Dante Museum, opened last May, and curated by the Classense Library Institution with the collaboration of the Uffizi Galleries of Florence and with the contribution of the Emilia-Romagna Region, the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Ravenna and the Ravenna Chamber of Commerce. Casa Dante completes the exhibition itinerary of the Dante Museum, which was elaborated on the occasion of the 700th anniversary of the Poet’s death: it is a multifunctional space in which a number of exhibition rooms, a bookshop, an educational laboratory and a meditative court will be located.

The first room, created thanks to a collaboration put in place with the Uffizi Galleries, will house on long-term deposit some important works from the Florentine galleries, capable of documenting in particular the fortune of Dante’s iconography from the nineteenth century onward, a period in which the figure and work of Dante Alighieri experienced extraordinary fortune and acquired new meanings also in relation to Italian historical events. The joint work done with the Uffizi Galleries consolidates the relationship between Florence and Ravenna in their common participation in the Alighieri celebrations. The works coming to the city all come from the Modern Art Gallery of Palazzo Pitti and are Andrea Pierini ’sMeeting of Dante with Beatrice in Purgatory (1853), Dante Presents Giotto to the Lord of Ravenna (circa 1855), Giovanni Bastianini’s Bust of Piccarda Donati (1855), and Otto Vermehren ’s Paolo and Francesca (1900-1910).

Another room in Casa Dante is intended to house the Dante collections of the Classense Library, the institution that since the origin of the collections has been responsible for the preservation, display and scientific management of Dante’s material legacy, both with regard to the book collections (which currently participate with fine specimens in the regional diffuse exhibition “In su ’l Lito di Chiassi”) and to all the other collections that, starting from the symbolic date of 1865 (the year of the discovery of the poet’s bones) testify to the profound bond between Dante and Ravenna and the affectionate homage paid to the Supreme Poet up to the present day: in fact, the collection is not closed but rather in continuous growth, thanks also to the acquisitions that are being made precisely on the occasion of the seventh centenary. The Classense Hall, in short, constitutes a visitable repository of collections closely linked to the Dante Museum, and marks the opening to the wider public of objects hitherto destined more for the world of scholars, in a perspective of enhancement and revitalization of cultural heritage.

Alongside the exhibition spaces, the teaching laboratory will offer work and training spaces for students, while the Meditative Court will welcome visitors in a collected space in ideal continuity with the Zone of Silence. The exhibition spaces, visible since September 19, will then be complemented by a space dedicated to the world of design, again declined in a Dantean version, thanks to the prestigious collaboration with Adi design Museum - Compasso d’Oro of Milan and which is nearing completion: a selection of objects from the historical collections of the Compasso d’Oro Award will develop an interpretation of Dante’s themes in a contemporary key.

Image: Giovanni Mochi, Dante Presents Giotto to the Lord of Ravenna, Guido da Polenta (c. 1855; oil on canvas, 84 x 108 cm; Florence, Uffizi Galleries - Palazzo Pitti, Gallery of Modern Art)

Casa Dante, a new space on the Supreme Poet, opens in Ravenna: collaboration between the city and the Uffizi

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