Soffici Museum

The Ardengo Soffici Museum was inaugurated on 16 May 2009 on the first floor of the Medici Stables, two years after the important exhibition "Soffici 1907-2007. One hundred years since the return to Italy", organised to mark the centenary of the artist's return to Poggio a Caiano.
The permanent exhibition reconstructs the artist's pictorial journey through forty key works from the various artistic movements embraced by the painter, from 1904 to 1962, representative of his style. Coming from public and private collections, they remain on loan to the Municipality of Poggio a Caiano. The exhibition aims to be a centre of visual documentation and a point of reference for reconsidering this artist within the context of European culture. In addition, at the Medici Stables visitors can also access a specialised Library with first editions of the Tuscan artist's printed works, a collection of critical bibliography, the complete series of the journals he directed or contributed to (in particular Leonardo, La Voce, Lacerba, Rete Mediterranea, Galleria), and an archive of images and documents related to him.
A significant cultural undertaking that marks an important milestone in the programme of research and studies that the Municipality of Poggio a Caiano has been conducting for years on the figure and work of Soffici, supported since 1992 by the Ardengo Soffici cultural association, which annually publishes the collection of Quaderni Sofficiani.
The painter was born in Rignano sull'Arno in 1879, but spent his whole life in Poggio a Caiano, the town he chose upon his return from Paris in 1907, after a seven-year stay during which he had met the leading figures of the French avant-garde, from Picasso to Apollinaire, Max Jacob and Braque.
Painter, writer and art critic, Soffici was one of the most important figures of our 20th century: a channel in Italy for many movements from beyond the Alps, he was co-founder of the journal Lacerba with Papini, embraced Futurism, then returned to a more objective naturalism, which he termed "synthetic realism". The new Soffici Museum is a tribute from the Municipality of Poggio a Caiano to this intellectual who chose to live in these places and immortalised the countryside in many of his works; alongside the Medici Villa and the Still Life Museum, the Soffici Museum is also an added value for Poggio's tourism, an opportunity to discover, through the artist and his very many contacts across the Italian cultural scene, a cross-section of 20th-century Art.

SOFFICI MUSEUM
Medici Stables
Via Lorenzo il Magnifico, 9
Poggio a Caiano – Prato
Tel. +39 055 8701287/0/1
www.museoardengosoffici.it

Ticket price: €3.00
Free up to 18 years of age

Opening hours:
From 1 April to 30 September:
Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and public holidays*
10.00-13.00/14.30-19.00

From 1 October to 31 March:
Friday, Saturday, Sunday and public holidays*
10.00-13.00/14.30-17.30

*The Museum will be open on the following public holidays: 6 January, Easter Sunday, 25 April, 1 May, 2 June, 15 August, 7 October for the feast of the patron saint of Poggio a Caiano, 1 November, 8 December, 26 December.
*The Museum will be closed on the following holidays: 1 January and 25 December.

GUIDED TOURS:

Guided tours can be arranged during the museum's opening hours, preferably by booking on: +39 055 8701287, or by e-mail at segreteria@ilgrappoloscs.it.

During the winter period, when the Soffici Museum's opening hours are limited to Saturdays and Sundays from 10.00 to 17.00, special openings for guided tours for groups may be arranged on other days of the week as well. This service must be booked and confirmed at the numbers and e-mail addresses given above.

Rate:
€3.00 per person (in addition to the cost of the admission ticket)