Word: bonacossi
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Germanic peoples, the Italians built their palaces with austere exteriors, content to have the opulence displayed within. But for the past 15 years, the Palazzo Capponi has defended from public gaze a greater treasure than most. Locked up there was the collection amassed by the late Count Alessandro Contini-Bonacossi. No outsider knew exactly what it contained and the only people with access to it were the dead count's heirs and a handful of their friends...
...importance of the works. Part of the dissent is ideological. The count's title was bestowed on him by Mussolini after he made a politic gift of several statues and other art objects to the Castel Sant' Angelo in Rome. Part is sheer Italian snobbery. Contini-Bonacossi was the son of peasants, who made his fortune in South America by methods that are still muffled in obscurity. When he returned to Florence, he set himself up as an art dealer and put his collection together between...
...Snow, is arguably the greatest surviving work by this unprolific Sienese master and worth, according to a spokesman at Christie's, "about $1,500,000." But it was stolen 60 years ago from the high altar of the church at Chiusi, near Siena, and purchased later by Contini-Bonacossi...