Galleria d'arte moderna Ricci Oddi

The Galleria d'arte moderna Ricci Oddi is a public art museum in Piacenza, Emilia-Romagna, Italy, dedicated to modern art from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Located at via San Siro 13, it holds a collection of roughly 400 works spanning the last two hundred years, with particular strengths in Italian painting from Romanticism through the early twentieth century. The gallery derives its name and core collection from Giuseppe Ricci Oddi (1868-1936), a local jurist and collector whose bequest established one of northern Italy's notable municipal museums of modern art. The institution remains municipally owned and continues to serve as Piacenza's principal venue for modern art.

Giuseppe Ricci Oddi began assembling his collection in 1897 upon returning to Piacenza after legal studies in Rome and Turin. His initial acquisitions, including Pecore tosate by Francesco Filippini and Dopo Novara by Gaetano Previati, were intended to furnish his family apartment. Early purchases were guided by the sculptor Oreste Labò. From 1909-1910, his collecting became more systematic, aided by Carlo Pennaroli, an art expert and amateur painter who accompanied Ricci Oddi to the Venice Biennale and introduced him to artists' studios. Purchases accelerated after 1911, concentrating on nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century landscapes and portraits.

In 1913, Ricci Oddi resolved to house his collection in a purpose-built public gallery, rejecting existing palaces due to inadequate lighting or unsuitable layouts. He commissioned architect Giulio Ulisse Arata to design a new building on land formerly occupied by the convent of San Sisto, which the commune of Piacenza purchased and made available in 1924. On 27 December 1924, Ricci Oddi formally donated his works to the commune and established the gallery as a legal entity. Construction incorporated surviving elements of the former convent.

The gallery was erected as a moral entity (ente morale) in April 1931, with the Piacenza painter Giuseppe Sidoli appointed first director, a post he held until 1967. The official inauguration took place on 11 October 1931 in the presence of Prince Umberto of Savoy and Princess Maria José of Belgium; Ricci Oddi himself did not attend. The museum opened to the public on 28 October 1931 with an original installation of over 450 works curated by Ricci Oddi with Arata and painter Aldo Carpi.

Post-inauguration, Ricci Oddi provided acquisition funds from 1934, and upon his death in 1937 left his entire estate to ensure the gallery's financial independence. A room dedicated to Piacenza painter Stefano Bruzzi was documented from 1942. During World War II, the gallery's external iron grating was replaced with brickwork so the metal could be diverted to military production, and major paintings were evacuated to Castello di Torrechiara, though a contemporary art exhibition was held at the Piacenza site in February 1945. The gallery reopened in 1947, with acquisitions continuing at a reduced pace. A room for contemporary artists was added in 1963.

The gallery gained international attention on 22 February 1997 when Gustav Klimt's Ritratto di signora was stolen. The painting, acquired by Ricci Oddi in 1925, had been revealed the previous year to be a repainted version of Klimt's earlier Ritratto di Ragazza, exhibited in Dresden in 1912 and subsequently considered lost. The theft occurred during a three-day window before the work was to be moved to Palazzo Gotico for an exhibition; the empty frame was later found on the gallery roof. On 1 April 1997, border police at Ventimiglia intercepted a package containing a high-quality forgery addressed to a former Italian prime minister. By 2016, investigators had spoken with an individual who claimed to have substituted a forgery for the original and stolen both. The painting was recovered in December 2019 when a gardener clearing ivy discovered a small trapdoor in the building's wall, behind which the work was found wrapped in plastic. The museum remained closed for four years following the theft.

The Ricci Oddi collection encompasses approximately 400 works, organized according to regional criteria and monographic rooms. Its holdings are predominantly Italian, with some international pieces, covering art from Romanticism through the mid-twentieth century. The collection reflects Ricci Oddi's personal taste, which favored landscape and portraiture across two principal genres. Nineteenth-century works form a substantial core, representing major movements including Romanticism, the Macchiaioli, Divisionism, and Symbolism. Twentieth-century holdings extend through early modernism. The French source notes that the museum's works are classified by regional criteria and monographic rooms, a system that shapes visitor navigation of the collection.

The nineteenth-century holdings include works by Francesco Hayez, Giovanni Segantini, Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo, Giovanni Fattori, Silvestro Lega, Telemaco Signorini, Raffaello Sernesi, Giuseppe Abbati, Cristiano Banti, Tranquillo Cremona, Daniele Ranzoni, Luigi Conconi, Gaetano Previati, Angelo Morbelli, Antonio Fontanesi, François-Auguste Ravier, Antonio Mancini, Domenico Morelli, the Palizzi brothers, Francesco Paolo Michetti, Stefano Bruzzi, Francesco Ghittoni, Luciano Ricchetti, Federico Zandomeneghi, and Giuseppe De Nittis. Among twentieth-century artists represented are Francesco Bosso, Umberto Boccioni, Giulio Aristide Sartorio, Plinio Nomellini, Mario De Maria, Medardo Rosso, Giacomo Grosso, Amedeo Bocchi, Felice Carena, Carlo Carrà, Piero Marussig, Arturo Tosi, Massimo Campigli, Felice Casorati, Filippo De Pisis, Francesco Messina, Adolfo Wildt, Bruno Cassinari, and Achille Funi.

The most celebrated single work was Gustav Klimt's Ritratto di signora, acquired in 1925. This painting's significance increased dramatically when research revealed it to be a repainted version of Klimt's Ritratto di Ragazza, known from its 1912 Dresden exhibition and long considered lost. The Klimt was stolen in 1997 and recovered in 2019, as detailed above.

The gallery building was constructed from 1924 to 1931 to designs by Giulio Ulisse Arata on land adjacent to a deconsecrated convent, the convent of San Sisto. Ricci Oddi specified a Renaissance-style building connected to the former monastery's surviving structures. Arata selected the site and integrated recovered elements of the convent complex with the new construction. The building occupies via San Siro 13 in central Piacenza. During World War II, the original external iron grating was replaced with brickwork so the metal could be repurposed for military production. The 2019 recovery of the Klimt painting revealed a small trapdoor in an exterior wall, concealed behind ivy, suggesting previously unremarked features of the building's fabric.

The Galleria d'arte moderna Ricci Oddi is located at via San Siro 13 in Piacenza, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy. The museum is owned by the commune of Piacenza. It displays modern art from the last two hundred years and maintains an active website at www.riccioddi.it. The gallery's present role continues as Piacenza's principal public institution for modern art, building upon its 1931 foundation as a municipal museum.