Director of Rome's Borghese Gallery suspended for two months from her post

Anna Coliva, director of the Borghese Gallery in Rome, has received a sixty-day suspension from her post, during which she will receive no salary. This was announced by the daily newspaper Repubblica, which, in an article signed by Carlo Alberto Bucci, talks about how the suspension was decided by the direction of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and is effective immediately. The measure, ratified by a letter signed by the secretary general of MiBACT, Carla Di Francesco, comes in the wake of allegations made against the director, who a few weeks ago was remanded for trial on charges of absenteeism that would foreshadow the hypothesis of the crime of aggravated fraud against the state. The article states that Anna Coliva’s associates “describe her as calm even though intimately troubled by the ’infamous accusation.’”

The facts for which Anna Coliva has appeared in court date back to 2014: the director, then a ministerial official at the head of the Borghese Gallery (before the Franceschini reform, in fact, there was no provision for a figure of “director” proper: directors were actually framed as officials) allegedly punched a time card without, however, showing up in her office. The damage would be modest, however, because it would be 40 hours and 59 minutes in all, but according to the prosecution sufficient to foreshadow the crime hypothesis. The director’s line of defense centers on the fact that during the absences Anna Coliva was on regular leave and in some cases would even be on vacation. Already after the first hearing, defense lawyer Alessandro Diddi had stated that there is all the elements that can completely exonerate Anna Coliva from the charges.

However, the director must now face a measure that comes before the ruling and leaves the Borghese Gallery without a guide at a delicate moment since in these two months the budget must be approved and the exhibition on Picasso the sculptor scheduled for the fall must be organized.

In the photo: Anna Coliva

Director of Rome's Borghese Gallery suspended for two months from her post

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