Agreement on Charitable Contribution to Restoration of New Hermitage Twenty Columns Hall Signed

On 7 August, 2003, in the State Hermitage Museum was signed an agreement with Confindustria Corporation (Italy) on a charitable contribution to the restoration of the Twenty Columns Hall in the New Hermitage. Mikhail B. Piotrovsky, Director of the State Hermitage Museum, and Mr. Giancarlo Cerutti, Vice-president of Confindustria Corporation, took part in the signing ceremony, which was also attended by Mr. Marco Ricci, Italian Consul General in St. Petersburg. The Hermitage possesses a rich collection of ancient Italic and Roman art. Most of the artifacts come from excavations in Italy and collections of famous Italian collectors like Pizzatti and G. Campana. The Twenty Columns Hall is a unique specimen of an original museum interior of the first half of the 19th century. Its decorations and showcases designed by the New Hermitage architect Leo von Klenze and executed at the factories of Gambs, Tour and Miller have been preserved intact. The exhibition in the Twenty Columns Hall displays Italic art of the 6th - 1st centuries B.C., including the excellent Lucanian and Apulian painted vases and gnazia ceramics. This collection of ancient Italian painted ceramics is one of the world’s largest outside Italy. The outstanding collection of South Italian vases will be for the first time as fully showed in the Twenty Columns Hall.

The project includes restoration of interiors and showcases and creation of a new system of lighting.