Page 263 - The Rough Guide of Sicily

art, many of them carefully rescued from earthquake rubble, and includes what is

perhaps Sicily’s finest collection of fifteenth- to seventeenth-century art. A much
larger museum building is being built next door, where the collection is due to be
transferred (ring for an update): until then, the layout of the museum is as described
here. In addition, many more items will be displayed in the new building, including an
ethereal statue of the Madonna and Child, attributed to Francesco Laurana, and a
collection of mainly ecclesiastical silverware, an art at which Messina once excelled.

The displays

The collection starts with some lovely Byzantine work, larded with a good helping of
Gothic, well evident in a fourteenth-century triptych of the Madonna with Child
between Saints Agatha and Bartholomew, and a remarkably modern-looking wooden
crucifix from the fifteenth century, with a sinuous, tragic Christ. The highlight is room
4, which holds marvellous examples of fifteenth-century art, notably the museum’s

most famous exhibit, the St Gregory polyptych, by Sicily’s greatest native artist,
Antonello da Messina – a masterful synthesis of Flemish and Italian Renaissance
styles that’s a good example of the various influences that reached the port of Messina
in the fifteenth century. The statue of Scilla, the classical Scylla who terrorized sailors

from the Calabrian coast (as described in Homer’s Odyssey), is on display in room 6
– an alarming spectacle, with contorted face and eyes awash with expression.
Sculpted by Montorsoli in 1557, it was once adjoined to an imperious figure of
Neptune in the act of calming the seas, a copy of which stands on the seafront just up
from the hydrofoil terminal. Also here are a couple of large shadowy canvases by
Caravaggio, commissioned by the city in 1609, the better of which is the atmospheric
Raising of Lazarus. The last room on the ground floor has a monstrous ceremonial

carriage from 1742, hauled out for viceregal and other high-ranking visits. Though
faded and tarnished, its gilt bodywork is still awesomely grandiose, showing an
impressive array of detail.

MESSINA BY NIGHT

Messina can be particularly beautiful by night, especially from the high Via
Panoramica – from here, with the city at your feet, there’s a long, sparkling view
across to mainland Italy. Via Panoramica changes its name along its route west of the
centre from Viale Gaetano Martino to Viale Principe Umberto and Viale Regina
Margherita. From the centre, the closest sections of this route are the Viale Principe

Umberto and Viale Regina Margherita stretch, where there are bars and pizzerias
around two floodlit sanctuaries (Cristo Re and Montalto) and plenty of scope for
pleasant evening strolling.