MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO OLIVERIANO
The work consists of the re-organization and set-up of the permanent collection of the Archaeological Museum of Pesaro - Museo Archeologico Oliveriano, in the spaces of the former stables of Almerici Palace, historical building which hosts the Foundation of Biblioteca e Musei Oliveriani di Pesaro.
The first nucleus of the collection is the result of the donation by Passeri and Olivieri, erudite archaeologists and antiquarians at the end of the 18th century, whose bequest is now property of the city of Pesaro. The museum therefore collects artefacts found in later phases: from the earliest antiquarian researches by Passeri and Olivieri (18th century), to the first modern scientific excavations in unified Italy (1893-1895) by Brizio, up to the most recent acquisitions in 2013, on the occasion of the works for the Adriatic Highways aside the Necropolis o Novilara. The artefacts testify a broad timeline of the history of the Adriatic territory, from the Neolithic to the early Christian civilization.
S.A.S. – Support - Artefact - Space
The intervention is the result of a six-year collaboration, from 2016 to 2022, which saw us architects working closely with the archaeological superintendency in the figure of Dr Chiara Delpino. The collections have been studied, dissected into scientific units and reassembled through site-specific solutions, investigating the design of supports and displays as element of mediation between the archaeological work and the architectural space.
Between play and science
The events leading up to the formation of public collection of Pesaro are emblematic of the birth of the discipline of archaeology, from a divertissement and tool for antiquarian collecting by gentlemen officials of the Papal States, to a humanistic discipline able to train professionals with the support of the sciences of topography and engineering.
The artefacts themselves bear the signs of this evolution; for years modern and contemporary archaeologists have questioned whether the beautiful engravings of the stelae from Novilara were original or re-engraved in the antiquarian workshops for a better market placement.
The first theme was therefore to create a narration -through space- about the birth of a discipline, initially practiced among the fields of literary erudition, collecting and antiquarian trade. What for scientists and archaeologists was a problem was for us a design suggestion.
The museum is a Neverland
The archaeological museum is an oneiric space, it suggests a space and time no longer existing. The stories of Neolithic women and men, of the Picenian inhabitants of the 8th century BC, of Roman colonizers are to be reconstructed and staged. As in children's games, the museum recreates units of imaginary sites through the metaphor and the play. The museum is often referred to as a testimonial and didactic space, on the contrary, in this work the topics of surprise and play are brought into the museography, because it is through the play that learning is possible: not only children, adults also have the right to play.
La visita è organizzata in sezioni didattico-museologiche – l’introduzione, la Necropoli di Novilara, il lucus pisauriensis, la Pesaro romana e paleocristiana, i temi del collezionismo frutto dei lasciti Passeri e Olivieri. Le sezioni sono articolate in ambienti dedicati, dove ogni spazio riservato ha la funzione di mettere in scena i reperti della collezione presentati, in un’ottica di allusione al tempo e allo spazio di provenienza.
The visit is organized in didactic sections - the introduction, the Necropolis of Novilara, the lucus pisauriensis, the city of the Romans, the city of the early Christian era and the collections of Passeri and Olivieri. The didactic sections are organized in specific halls, where each space has the function of staging the archaeological artifacts of the collection, suggesting the time and space of their origin.
livre de portraiture
The introduction room constitutes the first section. As in a portrait book, it presents the characters recalling the main scientific sections that organize the museum. Selected archaeological artworks float into a neutral space. They are placed in the space like actors on the stage during a performance, the visitors passes through them. The bases recall stylized figures from the animal and human world that allude to the history of the collection. These zoomorphic and anthropomorphic shapes play on the theme of the original and the fake, the stelae, engraved or re- engraved for the antiques market - originals and/or historical forgeries on the originals themselves are carried on the backs of imaginary animals that populate an oneiric space.
The disc of winds represents collecting, Olivieri wanted it at the beginning of the museum's itinerary in his bequest memory; the stelae from the Necropolis of Novilara represent the heart of the collection; the marble copies of emperors' heads represent the Roman world.
topic 1. Suggest a territory
The excavations from Brizio in the Necropolis of Novilara are among the first scientific archeological excavations of the Kingdom of Italy. A team of engineers and topographers surveyed the progress of the excavations and reported the location of the finds. The archaeologists' notes and photographic surveys testify the works on discoveries.
topic 2. holy space v/s scientific space
The museum space is a space for cultural and ethical education. On the one hand it exhibits the stories and the bodies of people who lived and died, some violently during a war; on the other hand it exhibits the scientific discipline and its discoveries.
The theme of respect for human remains is treated along the metaphor of the trenches used in the excavations by the group headed by Brizio. A central island - ideally made of earth - holds the original funerary stelae and the skeletons found in the burials. The beds that house them form abstract figures characterized by the light. The recall the positions of the burials. The central island is the holy space, the visitor walks along the edge.
