Until October 4, 16 marble masterpieces by Antonio Canova, Giovanni Cybei, Lorenzo Bartolini, Pietro Tenerani and other esteemed Italian marble sculptors will be on display at Palazzo Cucchiari in Carrara.
It is a homecoming for the sculptures, which include Canova’s Orpheus and Tenerani’s Psyche: all have been in the collection of the Hermitage in St. Petersburg since the reign of Tsar Nicholas I.
‘Canova and the Masters of Marble’ presents sculptures chronologically to show the stylistic evolution from neoclassicism to realism.
At the exhibition’s recent opening, art critic Vittorio Sgarbi commented on the ongoing debate about the possible closure of Carrara’s mines: ‘The case of Carrara’s quarries reminds me of Siena’s Palio or the Corrida in Spain. Elements so linked to the area, the labour of its people and traditions, that it is hard to conceive those places without them … Closing the quarries would be the death of Carrara.’
For information on the exhibition, see www.canovacarrara.it.
