REGGIO CALABRIA: Art and Culture (1st part)

It is one of  the oldest cities in Europe: the Calcidese colony was founded in the eighth century BC at the site of an ancient settlement dating back to the third millennium BC The site was previously occupied by indigenous peoples such as Aschenazi, the Ausonians and the mythical king Giocasto.

Reggio was one of the most important cities of Magna Grecia, reaching in the fifth century BC considerable political and economic importance under the government di Anassila. The polis or city-state reached, therefore, a great value thanks to its artistic and cultural Pythagorean school of philosophy and its schools of sculpture and poetry form in which artists such as Pythagoras from about:blankReggio and Ibico.

In Reggio there are  a lot of interesting places where its history is told.

·       National Museum of Magna Grecia

It is considered one of the most important museums of Ancient Greece. The building of Piacentini is rich in archaeological collections with numerous finds from the ancient city-sites of Calabria. In addition to the famous Riace bronzes, for which it has started the process for the recognition by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, the Museum of Reggio counts among its most important pieces: the head of the philosopher, the Kuros Reggio , the head of Apollo, the group of the Dioscuri, the bronze tablets archives of the temple of Zeus of Locri, the collections of pinakes, as well as jewelry and coins of various different historical periods.

  Civic Art Gallery

The new Art Gallery is located inside of the Francesco Cilea Theatre.   It includes a considerable number of paintings by masters such as Mattia Preti, Luca Giordano, Vincent Cannizzaro, Benassai Joseph, Ignatius Blackboard Fieschi, Andrea Cefaly and Lionello Spada. There you will see two tablets of Antonello da Messina from private collections. 

 Diocesan Museum

The building that houses the museum is located next to the Cathedral.The present collection is valuable and highly representative and includes:

• silvers, many of which are attributable to the shops Messina and Naples;

• a substantial core of liturgical textiles, manufactures outcome of Calabria, Sicilian, Venetian and French;

• a collection of paintings;

• eighteenth-century stone fragments from the altars of the ancient cathedral of the Assumption of the      Blessed Virgin Mary.

by Domenico Corriero