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Castello di Rivoli

Juvarra's unfinished Savoy residence on the hill of Rivoli, home since 1984 to the Museum of Contemporary Art, the first of its kind in Italy.

Image from ANSA Piemonte's report
From ANSA Piemonte, 24 September 2026

The Castello di Rivoli is the ancient Savoy residence that looks down from its hilltop over the town of Rivoli, west of Turin on the road to the Susa Valley, and that since 1984 has housed the Museum of Contemporary Art. A medieval fortress, a Baroque royal residence designed by Filippo Juvarra and never finished, a barracks, a ruin and finally a museum: its history traces almost the whole arc of the House of Savoy and, over the last half-century, that of contemporary art in Piedmont.[1]

From medieval castrum to the Savoy court

The castle first appears in documents in 1159 as «Castrum Riuollum» and then belonged to the bishops of Turin; it passed into Savoy hands in 1247, and in 1350 it hosted the wedding of Bianca di Savoia and Galeazzo Visconti[1]. Rivoli, ceded in 1244 by Emperor Frederick II to Count Amedeo IV, remained permanently with the Savoys and became one of their favourite residences[2].

In the sixteenth century Emanuele Filiberto chose Rivoli as the seat of his court while Turin was still in French hands; his heir Carlo Emanuele I was born in the castle, and according to the museum's account Nostradamus was summoned to attend the pregnancy of Duchess Margherita di Valois. The architects Francesco Paciotto and Domenico Ponsello modernised the building at that time[1].

The Manica Lunga and Catinat's devastation

Carlo Emanuele I entrusted Amedeo and Carlo di Castellamonte with turning the stronghold into a pleasure residence. In the first half of the seventeenth century this gave rise to the Manica Lunga, a wing 147 metres long and barely six wide, linked to the castle and intended for the ducal picture gallery[3]. Work on the complex ended in 1670, but in 1690 and 1693 the French troops of Marshal Catinat devastated the building: only the room known as the Hall of Amedeo VIII, on the second floor, survived[1].

Juvarra's unfinished dream

It was Vittorio Amedeo II, who according to the tradition reported by the museum had watched the castle burn from Turin, who wanted it rebuilt. Michelangelo Garove laid out the Stradone del Re, today's corso Francia, running straight from Turin to Rivoli, and drew the first designs between 1711 and 1713[1][2]. With Juvarra the design took on the proportions of a royal palace: the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani dates the new renovation project to 1715 and the suspension of work on the central block to 1720, and places Rivoli, together with Venaria, among the court's great out-of-town pleasure residences; the Basilica of Superga itself was conceived as an extension of the sightline linking the Castello di Rivoli to the Porta Susina[4].

At Rivoli Vittorio Amedeo II announced his abdication in 1730, and it was here that he was held prisoner in 1731. Work on the site stopped in 1734 because of its high cost: the monumental atrium and the ballroom of the main floor were never built, and the Manica Lunga, which Juvarra wanted torn down to achieve a symmetrical façade, remained standing[1][3]. Work resumed only in 1793 with Carlo Randoni, who designed the second-floor apartment[1].

Barracks, ruin and revival

In the Napoleonic era the emperor gave the complex to Marshal Ney. In 1883 the House of Savoy sold it to the town of Rivoli for 100,000 lire; until 1909 it was occupied by the army, which damaged it badly, and the Second World War, with its bombing, worsened the ruin[1]. The Manica Lunga became a barracks and during the Second World War housed displaced people[3]. In 1961, the centenary of Italian unification, one billion 120 million lire were allocated for its restoration, but in 1978 the vault of the great second-floor hall collapsed[1].

The restoration, begun in August 1979, was entrusted to the architect Andrea Bruno, who had already carried out the first surveys in the late 1960s. The Piedmont Region received the complex on a 29-year loan, and the collector Giuseppe Panza di Biumo proposed installing part of his own collection there. Bruno did not rebuild what was missing: he inserted a lift, a large suspended staircase and a walkway over the ribbed vault, leaving the unfinished parts legible[1]. The museum presents this choice with a maxim from Viollet-le-Duc:

«The best way to preserve a building is to find a use for it, and to satisfy the needs of that use so fully that there is no reason for any other changes!»

Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, quoted by the Castello di Rivoli

The Manica Lunga was restored between 1986 and 2000, with staircases and a lift in transparent materials designed by Andrea Bruno[3]. In 1997 the castle entered the UNESCO World Heritage List together with the Residences of the Royal House of Savoy, part of the so-called «Crown of Delights» that also includes the Castello di Moncalieri and Venaria[5].

The museum of contemporary art

Opened in 1984, the museum describes itself as Italy's first museum of contemporary art; its collection begins in the 1960s, with Arte Povera, the Transavanguardia, Minimalism, Body Art and Land Art[6]. Its first director was Rudi Fuchs, who opened it with the exhibition Ouverture; after him the museum was led by Ida Gianelli, Beatrice Merz, Andrea Bellini and Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev. Director Francesco Manacorda has said that Rivoli was born «thanks to Arte Povera», which he considers «a continuous and original wellspring»[7].

On 1 January 2016 Christov-Bakargiev took on the joint directorship of Rivoli and Turin's GAM, with the idea of also using the castle's ample spaces for the works of the city gallery, whose own spaces are limited: «I hope this two-faced, Janus-like museum will welcome people and become a new public gathering space», she said when presenting the project[8]. Manacorda, previously director of Artissima from 2010 to 2012 and artistic director of Tate Liverpool from 2012 to 2017, was chosen through a public call and has held the post since 1 January 2024[9]. Presenting his mandate, he announced that «over the years the museum will be perceived less as a castle and more as a place where people feel they belong»[10].

Today: the Cerruti Collection

Under a 2017 agreement with the Fondazione Cerruti, since 2019 the museum has opened a space devoted to the collection of the entrepreneur Francesco Federico Cerruti, which the foundation makes accessible to the public thanks to its partnership with the castle[6][11]. The collection, assembled from the late 1960s to 2014, comprises about a thousand works from the Middle Ages to the present, from Bernardo Daddi and Pontormo to Renoir, Modigliani, Kandinsky, Burri and Warhol, as well as a library of incunabula and fine bindings[11]. Chaired by Francesca Lavazza, the museum is supported by the Region, by Fondazione CRT, by the cities of Turin and Rivoli and by Intesa Sanpaolo; its holdings include video works acquired with Compagnia di San Paolo[12].

Pages linking here

Related articles: Rivoli

Sources

  1. Castello di Rivoli Museo d'Arte Contemporanea
  2. Treccani
  3. Castello di Rivoli Museo d'Arte Contemporanea
  4. Treccani – Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani
  5. UNESCO World Heritage Centre
  6. Consorzio Residenze Reali Sabaude
  7. Artribune — 17 December 2024
  8. Artribune — 15 September 2015
  9. Artribune — 26 September 2023
  10. Artribune — 30 January 2024
  11. Fondazione Francesco Federico Cerruti per l'Arte
  12. Castello di Rivoli Museo d'Arte Contemporanea

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