Image: Museo di Santa Giulia, Brescia
The Museo di Santa Giulia in Brescia will open ‘Tesori. Il grande romanzo dei musei bresciani. 1826–2026’ on 4 November 2026, bringing 100 works and objects from the city’s museum deposits into public view. The exhibition, curated by Stefano Karadjov and Roberta D’Adda, marks the bicentenary of the birth of Brescia’s Civic Museums and will remain on view through 22 August 2027.
Promoted by the Comune di Brescia, Fondazione Brescia Musei and Alleanza Cultura, the project is presented in collaboration with the Museo di Scienze Naturali di Brescia and the city’s Sistema Bibliotecario Urbano. Regione Lombardia is contributing to the exhibition, which has received the patronage of the Ateneo di Brescia and the Accademia di Scienze, Lettere e Arti.
The exhibition takes the formation of the civic collections as its subject, tracing the history of collecting, donation, study, conservation and display in Brescia. According to Fondazione Brescia Musei, the objects are connected to the women and men who preserved, donated or researched them, turning the collection into a record of personal histories as well as a history of the city’s institutions. Some of the selected works have not previously been shown to the public.
The presentation is divided into five sections: archaeology, figurative arts, nature, history and “elsewhere.” Its chronological scope runs from antiquity to the contemporary period. Archaeological material includes the first remains excavated at the Capitolium in 1826, together with Luigi Basiletti’s drawings made during the excavation, prehistoric finds from the Brescia area, Etruscan vases and Egyptian objects. The exhibition also draws on material from the Museo di Scienze Naturali, extending the story beyond conventional art-historical categories.
The figurative arts section includes works associated with the early formation of the Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo, among them drawings by Andrea Appiani, prints by Albrecht Dürer and Rembrandt, cameos, ivories and paintings dating from the 16th through the 20th centuries. Other listed works range from Francesco Hayez’s ‘Madonna in trono con il Bambino e una devota’ (1851) and Gerardo Dottori’s ‘Forze ascensionali’ (1919) to David LaChapelle’s ‘Gated Community’ (2003). The objects on view also include an 11th-century Byzantine astrolabe attributed to Sergio il Persiano, Japanese and African collections, material relating to the two world wars and more recent acquisitions by Fondazione Brescia Musei.
Personal stories will structure the visitor’s route through the galleries. The museum describes a group of collectors and custodians that includes an 19th-century watchmaker, a Red Cross nurse, a riding instructor, a sailor, a soldier, a priest, an Alpine captain and a secondary-school professor. Illustrator Elisa Macellari has created 20 portraits to accompany these narratives. The exhibition will also be linked to urban itineraries connecting Santa Giulia with works in the permanent galleries of the Civic Museums and with significant locations across Brescia. It will be open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. during the winter schedule and from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. from 1 June to 30 September.
