ARTE
Immerse yourself with us in the ancient art of our town and touch it with your hand
The people of Vasto have always liked to surround themselves with beautiful things. The splendid mosaics of the Roman baths bear witness to this, but also the paintings from the workshops of Veronese and Titian that the d’Avalos wanted to donate to the Collegiate Church of Santa Maria Maggiore.
In the 18th century, Vasto was defined as “Athens of Abruzzo” precisely because of the passion for art and literature of the Marquis Cesare Michelangelo d’Avalos. Unfortunately, his fantastic collection of canvases by Raphael and many of the major Renaissance painters was lost because it was sold at his death.
However, the passion for the figurative arts has always been strong, so much so that in the 19th century Vasto donated several painters to the Neapolitan academy. The most important of them, Filippo Palizzi, was the main exponent of the mid-century verista trend and many of his splendid works can be admired in the municipal art gallery.
An amateur painter in his youth was also Gabriele Rossetti, who passed on his passion to his son Dante Gabriel, who would later become one of the greatest English painters of the 19th century and founder of the Pre-Raphaelites.
However, the relationship with art in Vasto is not limited to the “passive enjoyment” of works from the past. The settings that open up in the city, a veritable balcony over the sea, are so beautiful that many paint or sculpt in their spare time. For this reason there are constantly exhibitions in the premises that the municipality makes available
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Figurative art, in Vasto, is therefore an everyday experience. To also donate this element of our local culture, at Best Vast we have given space to those who, for our parents, are the most significant artists in our territory.
In fact, in our room you can have breakfast in front of the splendid majolica mural “… and I will dream of the sea” by Michela Monteodorisio. The great artist, named after her husband Giuseppe Buono from the “Creta Rossa” workshop, captures the presence in the city of some 18th century Neapolitan girls (gardens of the Palazzo d’Avalos, church of San Teodoro in the Ciccarone Palace) and in recent years he has differently intervened in the redevelopment of the medieval quarter of Santa María, creating wonderful views that are today among the favorite corners of Vasto and tourists.
Welcome to the opportunity to combine your gastronomic experience with one of our exhibitions in our restaurant, the Taverna del Vasto. In both located in the workshops of a cousin’s 19th-century building, you’ll find a rotating solo exhibition by a local artist. The permanent collection that comes here when it is not temporary is the best Vastese collection of works by the artist Paolo De Giosa, a highly skilled portrait composer who worked on his historical paper used as a base: notarial notes from 1801, a newspaper from the 1960s, magazine clippings and more.
The combination of the historical dimension and the evocative capacity of De Giosa’s line made us choose him as the most representative author of what we think art should be today in a historical context like Vasto’s: craftsmanship, materiality, consciousness.
