With the opening of its new contemporary and modern art museum in the Palazzio Citterio, Milan has gained not only a major new museum but the completion of a long-planned project to link a number of its cultural assets into a single institution.
The new museum, which opened earlier this month in a 18th century building, is part of the Grand Brera project that links several institutions under the umbrella of the fine art museum Pinacoteca di Brera. The idea dates to the 1970s, but has run into many stumbling blocks before. The Grande Brera also includes the Brera Academy of Arts, the botanical garden, the Braidense National Library, all nearby and management of the church where Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper is displayed.
With the opening of Citterio to hold its modern collection, the Pinactoteca di Brera will now have more space for its major collections of works by Raphael, Tintoretto, Caravaggio and more. The Pinacoteca di Brera, originally founded by Maria Theresa of Austria when Milan was part of her realm, grew markedly during the Napoleonic era when Napoleon made it home to works seized by the French armies that conquered much of Italy.
