MuDAS - Museo Diocesano di Arte Sacra

MuDAS, Lecce's Diocesan Museum of Sacred Art, occupies the first floor of the Palazzo dell'Antico Seminario on Piazza del Duomo. Its collection includes paintings, sculpture, liturgical silver and vestments, with works by artists from Lecce and Naples.

Why it matters

The museum is housed within the Baroque seminary built for Bishop Michele Pignatelli. Work began in 1694 to designs by Giuseppe Cino and was completed in 1709; an attic storey was added in 1729. Among the collection's notable paintings is Paolo Finoglio's Sacra famiglia del cucito, whose composition reflects the influence of Caravaggio's Neapolitan period.

What to notice

The seminary cloister centres on a carved wellhead decorated with foliage, aquatic motifs, angel heads, fruit garlands and putti, topped by a statue of Sant'Irene. In the nearby chapel of San Gregorio Taumaturgo, Paolo De Matteis painted the titular saint in 1696. The museum's collection spans devotional paintings, wooden and papier-mâché sculpture, liturgical silver and vestments, with many works dating from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Context and history

The seminary completed one side of the enclosed Piazza del Duomo. Giuseppe Cino's design was based on the nearby Celestini façade, and Bishop Fabrizio Pignatelli oversaw the addition of the attic storey. The palace later developed into a diocesan cultural complex that includes the museum, a contemporary sacred-art gallery, the Biblioteca Innocenziana and an institute of religious sciences.