Musée du Petit Palais

The Musée du Petit Palais is a museum and art gallery in Avignon, southern France. It opened in 1976 and has an exceptional collection of "primitives" and early Renaissance paintings from Italy, which reunites those of the collection of Giampietro Campana deposed by the Musée du Louvre as well as paintings of the Avignon school deposed by the Musée Calvet. It is housed in a 14th-century building at the north side of the square overlooked by the Palais des Papes. The building, built in the early 14th century as the residence of the bishops of Avignon, was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site as part of the historic center of. Building Named Petit Palais to distinguish it from the Palais des Papes, the original structure was built during the period of the Avignon Papacy by Cardinal Berengar Fredol the Elder around 1318–20. The palace and a few neighbouring buildings were bought on de Frédol's death in 1323 by Cardinal Arnaud de Via, nephew of the reigning Pope John XXII. When de Via died in 1335, Pope Benedict XII bought the building for use as the episcopal palace. The subsequent building work created an interior close to that of the. Collection 390 works by Italian (327 by 130 artists) and French primitive or early-Renaissance painters such as Sandro Botticelli ( Madonna with Child, c. 1467) or Vittore Carpaccio. 600 sculptures including the effigy head from the tomb of Antipope Clement VII; the rest of the tomb was destroyed during the French Revolution. Paintings 13th and 14th centuries Simone Martini, Paolo Veneziano, Lippo Memmi, Taddeo Gaddi, Agnolo Gaddi (The Calvary), Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Bartolo di Fredi, Giovanni Baronzio.