Stories of people and works of art interwoven into a rich web of relations. Such an original and impassioned system is presented by the exhibition “Patrons, Collectors, Philanthropists. From the Medici to the Rothschilds”. From 18 November 2022 to 26 March 2023, the Gallerie d’Italia in Milan will be offering the opportunity to examine first-hand the history of commissioning, which brings famous artists into contact with great art enthusiasts, in particular the famous bankers who have given their names to vast and precious art collections, now shared among private and museum collections.

The Medicis, the Giustinianis, the Torlonias, the Rothschilds; families that made their mark in the history of art and beyond, as well as refined philanthropists and collectors such as Enrico Milyus, a German banker and entrepreneur who lived in Milan, a friend of Alessandro Manzoni and a patron of Francesco Hayez, John Perpont Morgan, an American businessman, whose collection was mostly donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, or the Italian Raffaele Mattioli, the “humanist banker” and admirer of Giacomo Mazù, Renato Gattuso and Giorgio Morandi. Portraits of art and of life that use well-known works to provide an account of history and the production mechanisms that surround them. It is an itinerary that begins with the Renaissance and ends in the twentieth century, from Verrocchio, via Michelangelo Buonarroti, Agnolo Bronzino, Michelangelo Merisi, better known as Caravaggio, Antoon Van Dyck and Francesco Hayez, right up to the more contemporary Giorgio Morandi.