Museo di Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce

Genoa's Villa Croce Museum of Contemporary Art combines a nineteenth-century villa and park with a collection of Italian and international art from the 1930s to the present.

Why it matters

Opened in 1985, the museum was an early civic commitment to contemporary art. The collection now contains more than four thousand works, with Italian abstraction as a central focus. The Cernuschi collection, which formed its founding core, includes works by Osvaldo Licini, Lucio Fontana, Bruno Munari, Paolo Icaro and Piero Manzoni.

What to notice

The collection includes works by Italian abstract and conceptual artists, with holdings by Fontana, Manzoni, Munari and Licini, as well as works by Ligurian artists. The LAB Laboratorio della Bassa Lunigiana donation includes Gunther Uecker's Natura ferita. The villa's sea-facing rooms, tall windows and parkland form a contrasting setting for post-war art.

Context and history

The Cernuschi collection established the museum's focus on Italian abstraction, while a 2001 donation from the LAB group and later acquisitions broadened its holdings. The villa and park became a public cultural site after the municipality acquired the property. The surrounding park forms part of the villa's historic setting.