After the huge flood that covered Florence in 1966, leaving behind the loss of thousands of works of art, the art historian Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti took the initiative to assemble a committee to raise worldwide public awareness and to ask local and international artists to donate some of their works to replace the ones that had been destroyed. Over 200 artists replied to the appeal of "Artisti per Firenze", as the initiative was named, and the City of Florence promised that their works would become part of a future international museum of contemporary art. That's how Museo del Novecento was born.
This Florentine museum is devoted to the Italian art of the twentieth century and houses a collection of about 300 contemporary works, divided into 15 exhibition spaces and organized through a path that traces the twentieth century, with its chronological, thematic and interdisciplinary approach, through paintings, sculptures, videos, installations and documents, and with the support of multimedia stations, sound devices and video rooms.
All this is housed in the old Leopoldine spedale (hospital), in the central Piazza Santa Maria Novella; the complex has been completely renovated and is now the new home of works by artists such as Giorgio de Chirico, Filippo de Piscis, Giorgio Morandi and Guttuso and the prestigious Alberto Della Ragione collection: 241 paintings and sculptures, donated to the city in 1969, and, this also, remained hidden for years, stored in the warehouses of the city.
