Museum of Capodimonte - Sala De Ciccio

National Museum of Capodimonte - Collection De Ciccio

Passionate collector, art expert and antique dealer, Mario de Ciccio was a fine exponent of a late-nineteenth-century elite culture. His skill in applied arts matured during his travels in Italy and abroad, especially in Paris and London, where, studying the extraordinary museum collections, he was able to refine his taste and develop a good nose for purchases, especially porcelain and majolica. Arrived in Naples from Palermo, his hometown, in 1906, he brought with him a fabulous collection that was further expanded and enlarged in the new adoption country, and he donated it to the Museum in 1958. Its collection represents a great proof of the vast and sophisticated world of applied arts, made of golden bronze, silver, branches and brass, of colored marble and of hard stone and shiny majolica or, still, capriciously carved and golden woods and elegant rococo china pottery. The four rooms of the Museum of Capodimonte (38-41), designed to welcome the important donation of about 1800 pieces, were reopened to the public thanks to the Superintendent Nicola Spinosa assisted by Arch. Ermanno Guida. The latter designed the layout after a long work of adapting the exhibition spaces to the new and modern object’s arrangement criteria in accordance with and continuity with the choices made for the historical sections of applied arts, also housed on the first floor of the museum. The collection consists of heterogeneous units, in terms of material and chronology aspects, though carefully constructed to represent the many declinations of the applied arts. In fact, the collector has chosen Italian majolica to document all types of the main peninsula productions centres. Among these, we can mention the Hispanic-Moorish-style majolica and Asia Minor ones, the Bourbon porcelain, the Meissen porcelain and some other Italian and European manufactures. In addition to these, the collection is added of Chinese and Japanese porcelain, a collection of Venetian glass and Façon de Venice, ivory, sixteenth century enamels from Limoges, fine objects such as fans, tobacco tins, watches and clocks, sacred vestments, fabrics and embroidery, silver objects for liturgical use, bronze, wax models, Sicilian shepherds and a large group of archaeological pieces. Beside art objects, there are also some stucco tabernacles of the Virgin, paintings and sculptures.
Project Prof. Arch. Ermanno Guida
Work Direction Arch. Liliana Marra