Villino Romualdo and Nori De’ Nobili Museum

ROMUALDO VILLA
Located in the town of Ripe, in the municipality of Trecastelli, Villino Romualdo is an elegant building from the second half of the 19th century. Until 1946, it was the private residence of Nazareno Sceral, then mayor, who dedicated it to his son Romualdo before leaving it as a gift to the community for social and cultural purposes.
Formerly home to a vocational training school for agriculture, Villino is now an important cultural and social hub, managed by the Municipality of Trecastelli. On the upper floor it houses the Nori De’ Nobili Museum, born from the desire of the municipal administration to promote the work and figure of the artist Eleonora De’ Nobili, known as Nori. The museum, among the few in the world dedicated exclusively to a female artist, collects a significant selection of her works and represents a point of reference for research and the valorization of her production.
In addition to the museum rooms, the Villino welcomes important services for the community. On the ground floor are the medical clinics, the blood collection point and the headquarters of the Bettino Padovano Music School – Trecastelli Section. The first floor houses the Tourist Office, the Municipal Library, and the Center for Studies on Women in Contemporary Visual Arts, a space dedicated to exhibitions and events involving contemporary artists, with a particular focus on the representation of women in art.

THE NORI DE’ NOBILI MUSEUM
The Nori De’ Nobili Museum, inaugurated on October 7, 2012 based on a design by Professor Carlo Emanuele Bugatti, is dedicated to the artist of the same name, who has deep ties to the area. Nori spent part of his life in Brugnetto di Ripe (now Trecastelli), in the historic “Villa dalle cento finestre”, an eighteenth-century residence that belonged to his maternal family. Since 2019, the management of the Museum has been entrusted to Prof. Stefano Schiavoni.
THE PERMANENT COLLECTION
The exhibition includes sixty-one works, which retrace the artistic evolution and the troubled existence of the painter.
First room: it houses his early works, with references to family affections, such as the portrait of his brother Alberto with the “Villa with a hundred windows” in the background and the paintings dedicated to his sister Bice. These works are linked to his stay in Florence (1924-1935), a period in which Nori immersed himself in a similar artistic and intellectual environment, frequenting the workshop of Ludovico Tommasi, the art critic Aniceto del Massa and the famous Caffè delle Giubbe Rosse, a meeting point of the culture of the time.

Second room: it testifies to the transition to a more intimate and introspective research, with the first self-portraits and dream images.

Third room: marks the period following his admission to the Villa Igea psychiatric clinic in Modena (1938). Numerous self-portraits show the painter in various clothes and hairstyles, recounting her incessant artistic research.

Fourth and fifth rooms: they house portraits of symbolic characters, such as dolls, clowns and the companions of the clinic.

Sixth and seventh rooms: they exhibit large-format works, including those in which Nori portrays himself with masks and fans. The Soul of Nori Rising to Heaven, painted on an X-ray plate, and Nori and Trees, his last work, left unfinished shortly before his death in 1968, stand out.

The museum also houses an archive of over fourteen hundred works and stands out as one of the exhibition spaces in the world dedicated exclusively to a female artist. Because of its uniqueness, it is also home to the Center for Studies on Women in Contemporary Visual Arts, which promotes research on female art through exhibitions and cultural initiatives.