Museo Civico Ala Ponzone, Art museum and heritage site in Palazzo Affaitati, Cremona, Italy.
The Museo Civico Ala Ponzone is an art museum housed in a historic palazzo in the center of Cremona, with paintings, sculptures, drawings, and decorative objects spanning from the Middle Ages to the early 20th century. The collection fills several rooms across different floors and also covers archaeology and applied arts.
The marquis Giuseppe Sigismondo Ala Ponzone, a retired entomologist and collector, left his art collections, assembled between 1877 and 1888, to his native city of Cremona. Since 1928 the museum has occupied Palazzo Affaitati on via Ugolani Dati. The paintings come from his bequest and from suppressed ecclesiastical institutions, among them large canvases from the church of San Domenico, demolished in 1869-1870.
The museum bears the name of Marquis Giuseppe Sigismondo Ala Ponzone, a retired entomologist who left his art collections, formed between 1877 and 1888, to his native city. The Carutti collection, donated in 2003, brought over sixty plucked instruments to the third floor: guitars, lutes and mandolins. The violins once held here were later moved to a separate museum.
The museum is located in the center of Cremona and can be reached on foot from the main square and cathedral. Plan for at least a couple of hours to move through the main rooms at a comfortable pace.
The Armadio del Platina in the Sala del Platina is a sacristy cupboard from Cremona Cathedral, inlaid with different woods in 1477 by the Mantuan artist Giovanni Maria da Piadena, called il Platina. It measures 2.66 by 7.74 metres. The museum also holds 29 painted ceiling panels from the Casa Meli, made in Bonifacio Bembo's workshop and restored in 2002.
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