On the occasion of the seventh centenary of Dante Alighieri 's death, the Royal Palace of Naples celebrates the Supreme Poet with an exhibition centered on three canvases depicting episodes from the Divine Comedy , performed by the painter Tommaso De Vivo for the king of Italy Vittorio Emanuele II in view of the centenary of Dante's birth celebrated by united Italy in 1865 and subsequently divided between the Royal Palace, the National Library and the Royal Palace of Caserta.

Exceptionally assembled in its original location after a careful restoration, the De Vivo cycle is exposed in comparison with other testimonies of Dante 's fortune in Neapolitan art around the mid-nineteenth century, from the famous painting by Domenico Morelli depicting Dante and Virgil in Purgatory ( 1844) to the lithograph album by Antonio Manganaro which illustrates in a satirical tone The Maritime Exhibition visited by Dante and Virgil (1871).

The exhibition, curated by the director Mario Epifani and Andrea Mazzucchi, is organized in collaboration with the University of Naples “Federico II”. The tour inaugurates a new exhibition space inaugurated in the area of ​​the so-called "Galleria del Genovese", a nineteenth-century connection between the Royal Palace and the Teatro di San Carlo, and is enriched by multimedia equipment, created by Stefano Gargiulo, which illustrate - through images taken from illuminated manuscripts - Dante's journey into the afterlife.