Built inside a sixteenth-century church, the Art and History Library of San Giorgio in Poggiale has housed the extensive book heritage of the Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna Foundation since 2009 and hosts important works of contemporary art , such as Campo dei Fiori and the monumental Delocation by Claudio Parmiggiani , as well as the Cattedrale cycle by Piero Pizzi Cannella.

The Art and History Library of San Giorgio in Poggiale , designed and built between 1589 and 1633 by the architect Tommaso Martelli, was entrusted to the Serviti Fathers until 1798.

Its name derives from the street on which it overlooks (today via Nazario Sauro), known until 1919 as via del Poggiale. Partially destroyed following the air raid on 25 September 1943, it was definitively deconsecrated and never reopened for worship, stripped of its furnishings and works of art.

It risked being demolished at the beginning of the 1960s, but was acquired by the Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna, which after a careful restoration, used it as the headquarters of its collections. The book collection includes more than 100,000 books of local history and art history volumes .

Also of significant value is the photo library made up of approximately 60,000 phototypes which preserve and testify to the urban changes of Bologna.