Palazzo di Brera

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Palazzo di Brera (around 1800)
entrance
patio

The Palazzo di Brera (or Palazzo Brera ) is a monumental baroque building in Milan . For a long time there was a Jesuit college in the palazzo in the Brera district . Since the second half of the 18th century, the Palazzo has been the seat of important cultural and scientific institutions, including the Pinacoteca di Brera .

history

The Palazzo di Brera stands on the site of a former Humiliati - monastery , built in the 12th century. After Pope Pius V repealed the Order of Humiliates, in 1571 the monastery went to the Jesuits at the request of Cardinal Karl Borromeo , who used it as a school and college for around 200 years. Due to the increasing space requirement, the architect Martino Bassi was commissioned shortly afterwards with a fundamental renovation, which was to be based on the Collegio Borromeo in Pavia. However, today's brick building was built a few decades later according to the plans of the master builder Francesco Maria Richini . Work began in 1627, but was interrupted in 1630 due to the plague and only continued from 1651, from 1658 under Richini's son Gian Domenico. Richini's inner courtyard is of particular architectural charm. Walkways, arranged one above the other on two floors, open to the courtyard with arcades supported by Doric double columns at the bottom and Tuscan double columns at the top .

After Clement XIV's repeal of the Jesuit order on July 21, 1773, the palazzo passed to the Habsburgs who ruled the Duchy of Milan . The architect Giuseppe Piermarini completed the inner courtyard and the classicistic west entrance on Via Brera in 1780. Under Napoleon Bonaparte , the church of Santa Maria in Brera was profaned , the facade removed and the nave divided horizontally. The gallery of the art academy was placed on the upper floor, and sculptures were exhibited below . In 1859 a bronze copy of Antonio Canova's statue "Napoleon as Mars" was placed in the courtyard (the original from 1809 is in Apsley House in London). During the Second World War, the palazzo was seriously damaged by air raids, which made it necessary to almost completely rebuild it.

Science and culture

The palazzo is home to a number of important cultural and scientific institutions. In 1764, the Jesuit Rugjer Josip Bošković founded the Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera at the college in Brera . After the abolition of the Jesuit order, Empress Maria Theresia housed the Imperialis Regia Bibliotheca Mediolanensis (today the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense ) in the Palazzo di Brera in 1773, expanded the Jesuits' botanical garden to the Orto botanico di Brera from 1774 and founded the Accademia di in 1776 Belle Arti di Brera . The building also housed the Palatine School of Philosophy and Law, a grammar school, laboratories and an agricultural society. The Pinacoteca di Brera was built under Napoleon from 1806 . Today's Istituto Lombardo can also be traced back to Napoleon, and it was supposed to play a role in the Kingdom of Italy (1805–1814) like the Institut de France did in France. The Società storica Lombarda, founded in 1873, is also on site .

Web links

Commons : Palazzo di Brera  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 45 ° 28 '19.4 "  N , 9 ° 11' 17.3"  E