The royal museums of Turin, from Saturday 8 March, are enriched with a new permanent exhibition section on the first floor of the Sabauda Gallery: it is “a space for Leonardo / Leonardo for the space”, an innovative multimedia setting to tell and enhance the collection of the designs of Leonardo da Vinci preserved in the royal library which, for reasons of protection, cannot be exposed continuously.
“A space for Leonardo / Leonardo for the space” presents information and multimedia systems, including a touch screen to fully browse the code on the flight and, in the center of the neobarocca room decorated with stucco, a treasure chest covered with mirroring material on which we reflect writings and drawings of the master who cover the walls.
The project, promoted by the royal museums, was curated by the architect Lorenzo Greppi with the collaboration of Francesca De Gaudio and Alessia Frosini (scenography), Faustino Montin (Museotecnica), Francesca Bellini delle Stelle and Chiara Ronconi (graphics).
Located in the two rooms in the center of the first visit of the visit of the Sabauda Gallery, where there is a large turnout of the public, the new space deepens the intertwining of stories between Leonardo da Vinci, its visionary art and the royal museums which, in the collections of the Royal Library, retain thirteen autographs of extraordinary historical-artistic value purchased by Carlo Alberto di Savoia in 1840, including the famous self-portrait. Thirteen designs that are placed along the entire chronological span of the life of the Renaissance master and that document the variety of his interests, the extended plot of his explorations and his unequaled ability to arrive, with the means of drawing, to the deeper essence of things.
To enrich the Leonardesca collection of Turin, the Code of the Birds on the Birds, the precious manuscript in which Leonardo’s reflections on the theme of flight and the study of the anatomy of birds alternate with mechanical and hydraulic exercises, architecture and design drawing, connecting and illustrating crucial issues of his studies, arrived in the royal library in 1893.
The new preparation opens the video that tells the journey of Leonardo’s self-portrait and the code on the flight of birds, digitally reproduced in a microchip, aboard the Curiosity rover launched by Cape Canaveral on November 26, 2011: thanks to an idea of Silvia Rosa-Brusin of the Tgr Leonardo della Rai, welcomed by NASA, Leonardo was still on August 5, 2012 and is still exploring. The red planet. At the center of the mirror box, the multimedia installation Leonardo da Vinci: the vision of the genius between real and virtual, designed to designed by the company Mnemosyne and curated by Cristian Casella and Nicola Sganga, allows the public to go and access the universe of Leonardo thanks to an immersive experience, for a new method of the story of the famous self -portrait. The Leonardo space will allow you to present to rotating, within an armored and air -conditioned showcase inside the casket, an original design of the precious collection of the Royal Library.
Faced with the new exhibition space and next to the museum ticket office, the Bookshop of the Royal Museums also reopens to the public, entrusted to Silvana Editoriale and created on a project by Loredana Iacopino Architecture.
The presentation of the permanent setting, together with the restoration of the courtly environments and the collections of the royal coffee carried out on a project by Lorenza Santa with Tiziana Sandri, was animated by musical interpretations performed in collaboration with the “Giuseppe Verdi” Conservatory of Turin. Live music alternated with a theatrical performance by Stefania Rosso, on a text taken from the work “That great genius of my friend” by Oliviero Corbetta, inspired by the life, travel and mysteries of Leonardo da Vinci who, with his talent, has passed the limits of the human understanding leaving a timeless legacy.