Museo della Ceramica

For six centuries Savona and Albisola produced tableware for Mediterranean markets. The ceramics museum preserves that history in a Renaissance palace once used by the Monte di Pietà, with historic maiolica, pharmacy jars, avant-garde stoneware and contemporary design.

Why it matters

Ceramics are central to Savona and neighbouring Albisola, where production has continued for more than six centuries. The museum documents this history from Renaissance maiolica to present-day design. The museum occupies the Palazzo del Monte di Pietà, whose fortunes were set in motion in 1479 at the wish of Pope Sixtus IV, the Savonese Franciscan associated with the adjoining convent complex. Its walls retain Renaissance frescoes uncovered during restoration. The neighbouring Pinacoteca Civica places maiolica and painting within a shared cultural setting.

What to notice

The palace's restored rooms present sixteenth-century maiolica and narrative istoriato ware of the Baroque, including dishes painted by the Guidobono circle. The pharmacy ceramics include jars from the former pharmacy of the Ospedale San Paolo and apothecary furniture from Genoa's Farmacia Cavanna. Blue-and-white majolicas from the Boncompagni-Ludovisi and Folco collections illustrate Savonese ware's export history. Twentieth-century holdings include works by Asger Jorn, Wifredo Lam and Giuseppe Capogrossi, followed by contemporary artists El Anatsui, Michelangelo Pistoletto and Martí Guixó. The Quadrisfera, a multimedia installation by astrophysicist Paco Lanciano, interprets the history of Ligurian ceramics through light and sound.

Context and history

The palace began as a medieval private residence and became in 1479 the seat of the Monte di Pietà, the charitable pawn bank established at the wish of Sixtus IV, who had trained as a young franciscan in the convent complex beside the cathedral. Restoration brought the building's earlier layers to light, above all the second-floor gallery of mural paintings, where frescoes have been attributed to the sixteenth-century Lombard painter Lorenzo Fasolo, including an "Angelo Annunziante", a "Pietà" and a "Madonna di Misericordia" portrayed with the officials of the Monte. Between 2008 and 2009 the Fondazione De Mari CR Savona acquired the palace and began a careful restoration to turn it into the city's ceramics museum, inaugurated at the end of 2014; since 2017 a dedicated foundation, the Fondazione Museo della Ceramica di Savona, has managed it. The collections themselves are the fruit of a joint undertaking between the municipality and the foundation, uniting public holdings and private collections that had never been shown together before.