Description
The Galleria Nazionale di Palazzo Reale is the museum inside the Savoy royal palace on Via Balbi in Genoa: intact Baroque rooms, more than two hundred paintings, a sumptuous hall of mirrors and a hanging garden overlooking the old port.
The palace was built by the Balbi in the mid-seventeenth century, enlarged by the Durazzo and then bought in 1824 by the House of Savoy, who made it their residence in Genoa. Since 1919 it has belonged to the State and houses a museum with original frescoes, stucco work, paintings and furnishings.
The most famous room is the Hall of Mirrors, decorated by Domenico Parodi for Gerolamo Durazzo and handed down to us intact. It set out to rival the galleries of Roman palaces and that of Versailles, with paintings, stucco, mirrors and ancient statues.
At the end of the gallery is the Rape of Proserpina by Francesco Maria Schiaffino, a reinterpretation of Bernini's group with even more whirling movement. Along the sides, four white marble statues by Filippo Parodi tell myths from Ovid's Metamorphoses.
The gallery's paintings hide a moral, perhaps suggested by the Jesuits whose college stood opposite. On the vault, Venus, Bacchus and Apollo are the vices that ruined the ancient empires, while the Virtues guide the Durazzo.
The picture gallery fills both piani nobili. Among the best-known works are the portrait of Caterina Balbi Durazzo, painted by van Dyck at the age of twenty-five, and his Christ Expiring, alongside canvases by Strozzi, Grechetto, Guercino, Luca Giordano and Tintoretto.
Among the rooms, the Throne Room and the ballroom were redecorated in 1842 for the wedding of Victor Emmanuel II. From the palace you step out onto the hanging garden, created in the early eighteenth century by the architect Carlo Fontana, with views towards the port.
The Veronese Room still bears the name of the Feast in the House of Simon, the Durazzo family's most famous painting. When the Savoy bought the palace, they took it to Turin along with other masterpieces and replaced it with a copy, amid protests from the Genoese.
The palace hosted Joseph II of Habsburg in 1784, then Joachim Murat and Napoleon. Until 1964 a bridge linked it directly to the harbour landing stage: it was demolished to build the elevated road.
The palace was built by the Balbi in the mid-seventeenth century, enlarged by the Durazzo and then bought in 1824 by the House of Savoy, who made it their residence in Genoa. Since 1919 it has belonged to the State and houses a museum with original frescoes, stucco work, paintings and furnishings.
The most famous room is the Hall of Mirrors, decorated by Domenico Parodi for Gerolamo Durazzo and handed down to us intact. It set out to rival the galleries of Roman palaces and that of Versailles, with paintings, stucco, mirrors and ancient statues.
At the end of the gallery is the Rape of Proserpina by Francesco Maria Schiaffino, a reinterpretation of Bernini's group with even more whirling movement. Along the sides, four white marble statues by Filippo Parodi tell myths from Ovid's Metamorphoses.
The gallery's paintings hide a moral, perhaps suggested by the Jesuits whose college stood opposite. On the vault, Venus, Bacchus and Apollo are the vices that ruined the ancient empires, while the Virtues guide the Durazzo.
The picture gallery fills both piani nobili. Among the best-known works are the portrait of Caterina Balbi Durazzo, painted by van Dyck at the age of twenty-five, and his Christ Expiring, alongside canvases by Strozzi, Grechetto, Guercino, Luca Giordano and Tintoretto.
Among the rooms, the Throne Room and the ballroom were redecorated in 1842 for the wedding of Victor Emmanuel II. From the palace you step out onto the hanging garden, created in the early eighteenth century by the architect Carlo Fontana, with views towards the port.
The Veronese Room still bears the name of the Feast in the House of Simon, the Durazzo family's most famous painting. When the Savoy bought the palace, they took it to Turin along with other masterpieces and replaced it with a copy, amid protests from the Genoese.
The palace hosted Joseph II of Habsburg in 1784, then Joachim Murat and Napoleon. Until 1964 a bridge linked it directly to the harbour landing stage: it was demolished to build the elevated road.