Civic Art Gallery of Reggio Calabria

The Civic Art Gallery of Reggio Calabria is a museum that preserves and exhibits works of art mainly owned by the Municipality of Reggio Calabria. The oldest works (15th-19th century) derive from the collections of the former Civic Museum, founded in 1882 and suppressed in 1948; the most modern works (19th-20th century) derive from purchases and donations.

The most valuable works from the collections of the former Civic Museum are undoubtedly the two wooden tablets San Girolamo penitent and Three angels visiting Abraham painted by Antonello da Messina around 1460 and purchased by the Municipality of Reggio Calabria in 1890 from Giovanbattista Rota, descendant of a noble family from Reggio. Among the state works, however, the return of the prodigal son by Mattia Preti and The Battle of Capua by Andrea Cefaly stand out. Among the modern works, there are numerous those by Calabrian artists: from the 19th century the landscapes of Ignazio Lavagna Fieschi from Reggio and his pupil Giuseppe Benassai and the sculptures of Francesco Jerace; from the 20th century the paintings by Rubens Santoro, Francesco Raffaele, Antonio Cannata, Enzo Benedetto; the sculptures of Pasquale Panetta and Saverio Gatto. Among the non-Calabrian artists, we remember Giovanni Omiccioli, Giampiero Restellini and Renato Guttuso, of whom an ink drawing on cardboard is exhibited, Pescatore Scillese, with whom he participated in the Calabrian Art Biennale in 1949.