Reasserting the importance of collaborative efforts among European museums, the Musée du Louvre has formed a partnership of unprecedented scope with the Museo di Capodimonte for 2023.
The royal palace (reggia in Italian), which once served as a hunting lodge for Naples’s Bourbon monarchs, is now one of the largest museums in Italy, as well as one of the most important picture galleries in Europe in terms of both number and quality of works. Capodimonte is one of the few museums in Italy whose collection covers all schools of Italian painting. It also houses the second largest department of drawings (after the Uffizi) and a remarkable collection of porcelain.
Approximately seventy major masterpieces from Capodimonte will be exhibited in three different places in the Louvre: the prestigious Grande Galerie will display a stunning selection of works from two of the world’s foremost collections of Italian paintings; the Salle de la Chapelle will present the history and diversity of the Capodimonte collection, assembled for the most part by the Farnese and Bourbon families; and finally, the Salle de l’Horloge will showcase four outstanding cartoons (preparatory drawings) from the former Farnese collection: one by Michelangelo, another by Raphael, and two by members of their circles. These will be on display alongside the Louvre’s drawings by Raphael or his workshop.
Extending beyond the Louvre’s galleries, an ambitious programme of cultural events will lend this occasion the dimension of a veritable Neapolitan season in Paris.
In the words of Laurence des Cars, president-director of the Louvre, ‘An exceptional event is scheduled at the Louvre in 2023: the finest masterpieces from the Museo di Capodimonte will join those of the Louvre for the first time, at the heart of the Paris museum. This six-month “Neapolitan season” in Paris will be accompanied by a diverse programme of music and films. The Louvre and the Museo di Capodimonte have many things in common and much to exchange: both museums were originally royal palaces, their collections were inherited from the most eminent monarchs, and they are symbols of the historical links between France and Italy. I would like to express my sincere thanks to Sylvain Bellenger, director of the Museo di Capodimonte, who has honoured us by accepting our invitation. This exceptional and unprecedented partnership is a perfect example of my vision for the Louvre’s future role in Europe and museums’.
Sylvain Bellenger expressed his honour at the invitation from the president-director of the Louvre as follows: ‘This exhibition will bring enormous prestige both to Naples and to the Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte. The history of the museum is inextricably linked to that of the kingdom of Naples, just as the history of the Louvre is inextricably linked to the French Revolution. Many visitors will already be familiar with some of the masterpieces in the Capodimonte collection – such as Danae and the Portrait of Pope Paul III by Titian, and Antea by Parmigianino – as they feature in art history textbooks; however, their connection with the Capodimonte may come as a surprise, as the museum is famous among art lovers but still unknown by the public at large. Although the French have a historic attachment to Naples, visitors to Pompeii do not necessarily include the Capodimonte in their modern-day Grand Tour, even though it is one of Europe’s foremost museums’.