Contini Bonacossi collection, Art collection at Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy

The Contini Bonacossi collection is an art collection housed within the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, containing around 35 paintings, 12 sculptures, and 11 Della Robbia ceramics with coat of arms designs. These works are displayed in dedicated rooms that showcase different artistic styles and periods from Italian art history.

Alessandro Contini Bonacossi (1878-1955), an antiquarian and art dealer, and his wife Vittoria assembled the private collection. Named senator of the Kingdom of Italy by Mussolini, he promised the works to the State while keeping their use for life. After 1945 the couple restated the intention to donate everything intact; he died in 1955 without completing the terms, and the heirs ceded part of the collection to the Italian State in 1969.

The collection features works by Italian masters from different periods of the Renaissance and Baroque eras, displayed in dedicated rooms within the gallery. Visitors encounter paintings, sculptures, and decorative pieces that show how artistic styles evolved across centuries of Italian art.

Since 1 March 2018 the collection has been part of the normal Uffizi visit route, in the former "blue" or "foreigners'" rooms, so no separate booking is needed. Before that date it was shown in a Superintendency room on via Lambertesca, next to the Uffizi, open free but only by reservation. Look for the rooms off the main itinerary.

The photograph shows a reclining bearded marble figure on a slab, itself set on a base carved as a tree trunk with branches and leaves, with a small white label near the legs. The collection's history holds a comparable surprise: of 1,066 objects declared by the heirs, a commission of art historians chose only 35 paintings, and excluded works such as Zurbarán's still life, now in Pasadena.