The rebirth

Of italian

maiolica: GINORI

and Cantagalli

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Press release

1 / The exhibition, the museum, the restorations

The splendid glazes, the fine pictorial qualities, the eclecticism of forms. The styles and harmonies that between the 19th and the 20th centuries dazzled visitors to the Universal Exhibitions throughout Europe.

With over one hundred masterpieces (vases, jars, plates, tiles, and garden items), the two famous factories of Ginori and of Cantagalli are at the heart of the exhibition The Rebirth of Italian Majolica with which the Stibbert Museum opens an extensive calendar of exhibitions dedicated to the artistic crafts of Florence and the golden age of antique trade and collecting having the collective title of The Treasure Rooms.

This first survey has been curated by Oliva Rucellai and Livia Frescobaldi Malenchini. It has been promoted by the Associazione Amici di Doccia and is part of the Little Big Museums series of initiatives, conceived and organized by the Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze, the Regione Toscana, and the Municipality and the Province of Florence. The exhibition has been organized under the High Patronage of the President of the Republic, under the aegis of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and the support of Arcus, Monte dei Paschi di Siena Foundation, and Banca di Cambiano. The Polo Museale Fiorentino, Association of Antique Dealers, XXVII Antiques Biennial, and the Osservatorio dei Mestieri d’Arte have also contributed to the initiative.

The works, many on display for the first time, have varied and prestigious international provenances: the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, the Victoria & Albert Museum and the William De Morgan Foundation in London, the Musée National de la Céramique in Sevres, the Bargello Museum, some private English collections and the Doccia Museum. A good 43 works belong instead to the Stibbert Museum’s vast Cantagalli collection, mostly unavailable to the public. They are all pieces purchased personally by the founder Frederick Stibbert (1838-1906), an English magnate, born in Florence.

The exhibition is obviously dedicated to the lovers of a genre greatly appreciated throughout Europe, as also demonstrated by the financial support given by the prestigious Swiss foundation Stiftung Ceramics to the publication in Italian and English of the catalogue (published by Polistampa).

The spectacular beauty of these artefacts, their vibrant colours and the different styles (neoclassical, Renaissance, Rococo, Liberty), are bound to fascinate also the general public. For the specialists instead, the numerous unpublished artistic and documentary works are a source of important news (in particular from the archives of the Doccia Museum). There is also a series of previously unpublished drawings which are among the most significant pieces that emerged with the recent classification of the Fondo Cantagalli, kept in Faenza at the International Ceramics Museum, carried out by the Associazione Amici di Doccia.

The exhibition also starts an interesting educational program aimed at artisanal pottery, which involves four museums: the museum in Montelupo and the Galileo Chini Museum in Borgo San Lorenzo as well as the Stibbert and the Doccia (in Sesto Fiorentino). It is one of the initiatives designed to promote a ceramics circuit that also includes the Bitossi Foundation in Montelupo.

Thanks to the Little Big Museums project, the Stibbert Museum has re-opened the Room of Antique Plates as well as the rooms on the first floor where the collector lived with his mother Giulia. Thus a decade of restoration work ends, carried out with support from the Ente Cassa which, among other things, enabled re-creating the layout that Stibbert had chosen for the villa, but which was altered after his death.

Extensive research has now enabled the reconstruction of the exact layout of the premises and the collections. The old decorations and the floors worn by the public passing through the rooms have been restored with furniture and paintings being placed once again where Stibbert had wanted them. The armouries have thus recaptured all their charm and the large reception rooms their eclectic wealth and harmony.

Thanks to these measures it is again possible to visit Stibbert’s bedroom with its simple brass bed; the Studiolo full of his favourite paintings, the sumptuous Empire Room inhabited by his mother, the Gallery with its neoclassical frescoes by Ademollo and the Yellow Drawing Room with its beautiful Venetian-style floor.

The Room of Antique Plates, decorated by Stibbert with plates and Cantagalli majolicas, was also intended for the collection of costumes. One of the rarities of the collection displayed there is the Petit Costume d’Italie worn by Napoleon I in 1805 when he was crowned King of Italy in Milan. The mantle has been beautifully restored and the whole room has become a focal point of the entire museum.

The majolicas, mostly Cantagalli, are distributed in many of the museum’s rooms, or embedded into the villa’s external walls and placed throughout the garden. A new photographic campaign launched with the exhibition has documented the entire collection, including the objects stored in the warehouses.

Stibbert Museum Hours Mon – Tue - Wed, 10 a.m. – 2 p.m., Fri - Sat - Sun 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. (closed Thurs)

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Press Office: Catola & Partners, Firenze, 055.5001941 – 055.5416944. , www.catola.com