Museo Revoltella

Multimedia guide to discover the treasures of the Revoltella Museum, the former home of Baron Pasquale Revoltella, a wealthy businessman of the nineteenth century art and progress lover. The museum consists of the magnificent historic mansion in which the Baron lived between 1795 and 1869 and the collection of modern art initiated by the Baron himself and continued over the years thanks to the rich bequest that he gave to the city just to enhance their artistic heritage. Throughout his life, Revoltella sponsored a number of projects that greatly benefited society at large, including a new water system for Trieste and the piercing of the isthmus of Suez. He entrusted to the Berlin-based architect Friedrich Hitzig the design and construction of his residence in a neo-Renaissance style, requesting that the main façade face onto piazza Venezia to allow him to look at the sea. Upon his death, that occurred in 1869, Revoltella bequeathed his palace and his fortune to the city of Trieste. Thus his residence became a museum, the museum that you are visiting today, and his wealth served to acquire, over more than a century, the extensive collection of paintings and sculptures that make up the modern art gallery. In order to display the collection, in 1963 the architect Carlo Scarpa renewed the building that stands next to the museum, known as Palazzo Brunner. The external façades remained unchanged, but the interior was redesigned to create vast linear spaces that contrasted with the museum’s 19th century appearance. Scarpa created a passageway that connected the two buildings, so that the second floor of the main residence would be joined to the third floor of the modern art gallery, a leap in time over a distance of just a few feet. To view all content the user needs to insert the code he was given at the museum entrance. The content estimated download time is 3 minutes...but it's worth it!