Gabinetto Vieusseux's hidden contemporary art collection revealed

The Gabinetto Vieusseux in Florence, founded in 1820 by Gian Pietro Vieusseux as a subscription reading room, holds an unexpected treasure: nearly 3,000 artworks including paintings, drawings, and sculptures. Its Archivio Contemporaneo, established in 1975, preserves not only literary archives of authors like Cristina Campo, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Giuseppe Ungaretti but also their artistic output. The collection features over 300 works by Pasolini as a painter and draftsman, sketches by Eugenio Montale, pieces by Giorgio Morandi, Renato Guttuso, and an etching by Goya from 1795. In early 2025, a catalog titled "Opere fra le carte. La collezione del Vieusseux" edited by Daniela Ferrari was published by Polistampa with support from Fondazione CR. The collection is searchable online via a dedicated platform. Recent additions include a donation by artist Erio Carnevali in summer 2024. The institution now holds 600,000 volumes, 160 archival funds, over 750,000 documents, and since 2020 an archive of new millennium women writers.