Borghese Gallery Tour
The Borghese Gallery, located in the Villa of the same name, is one of Italy's most famous collections of paintings and sculptures and attracts art lovers from all over the world. The small building, which houses world-famous works of art, can be compared to a modest-looking chest filled with priceless jewels.
Situated in the depths of a vast park, the Galleria Borghese was conceived and built in the early seventeenth century. It was initiated and inspired by the powerful nephew of Pope Paul V, Cardinal Scipione Borghese. A passionate collector who did not shy away from anything in order to get his collection of works of art that caught his fancy, from the very beginning Scipio conceived the building of the country villa as a place to store the family collection of works of art and his constantly growing personal collection.
At the very beginning of the twentieth century, the Borghese family owned the park and the villa with the family's art collection, which had been there for centuries, were sold to the Italian State.
The gallery's collection includes works by world famous Italian painters of the Renaissance, Mannerism and Baroque periods. The gems of the collection are The Deposition of the Coffin by Raphael, painted by the master for a private chapel in Perugia by order of his grief-stricken mother in the early 16th century and stolen from there a century later by order of Scipio, who coveted it for his collection. A painting by Titian, Love on Earth and Love in Heaven, which preserves the history of its composition and provides food for numerous interpretations of its content. The gallery holds several works by Caravaggio, the celebrated master of light and shadow. In addition, Botticelli, Correggio, Rubens, Lanfranco, Guido Reni and many other masters of the brush are represented in the rooms of the gallery.
In addition to paintings, sculpture is well represented in the gallery: the marble masterpieces by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, carved at the request of Scipio Borghese himself. Particularly notable are Apollo and Daphne, with its openwork mesh of laurel leaves, into which the haunted nymph is transformed; The Abduction of Persephone, where the young girl's marble flesh under the strong fingers of the master of the underworld of the dead seems alive; and David, in whose features the sculptor portrayed himself.
Nearby, in a separate room on a bed made especially for her, is the famous Venus the Victorious, a sculpture by Antonio Canova, commissioned by Prince Camillo Borghese. The model was Napoleon Bonaparte's beloved sister Pauline, the wife of the client.
An excursion to Villa Borghese with a visit to the gallery takes two and a half hours: half an hour for organization, two hours to see the collection. The gallery visit is strictly by reservation made in advance. The time of stay in the gallery is two hours. During the tour you will learn the history of the villa and the gallery, get acquainted with the works of famous sculptors, with the artworks of Italian painting stars.