Museum of Sacred Art of Val d’Arbia

The elegant salons of the nineteenth-century Palazzo Ricci Socini, a wonderful example of décor in Liberty (Art Nouveau) style, house the Museum of Sacred Art of Val d’Arbia.

A series of masterpieces signal the most important stops on a pictorial tour of the centre. Small icons on wood show precious devotional images of the Madonna and Child, from the oldest, by Duccio da Buoninsegna, to the delightful picture by Ambrogio Lorenzetti recently rediscovered under an eighteenth-century over-painting. The multi-part compositions of Luca di Tommè, Andrea di Bartolo and Sano di Pietro show the influence of the triptychs that once adorned the altars of churches throughout the countryside of the Val d’Arbia, while the refined panels of Matteo di Giovanni and del Brescianino stand out among the smaller works.

The artistic output of seventeenth-century Sienese culture is well represented, with paintings by Rutilio Manetti, Ventura Salimbeni and Bernardino Mei. A splendid collection of gold and textile vestments stands alongside the paintings and sculptures, tracing a seamless sequence through time from the fourteenth century to the nineteenth. In the large room on the ground floor, dedicated to altar-pieces,

the impressive array of panels painted by Francesco Vanni, Pietro Sorri, Rutilio Manetti, Alessandro and Ilario Casolari, Francesco Bartalini and Astolfo Petrazzi is a roll-call of the artists of note in Siena in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

The Museum is managed by the Siena Museums Foundation.