Spacer do Palazzo del Te
Both court artists, Mantegna i Giulio Romano, they lived near the Palazzo Ducale, and if you go to Palazzo del Te on foot (20 Min.), instead of taking the bus, you can see their houses.
Designed by Romano Casa di Giulio Romano on Via Poma, it remains in the shadow of the Palazzo di Giustizia adorned with monsters. Like his other works from Mantua, and this edifice was to make an impression on the educated elite, who considered disobedience to the principles of classical architecture as a manifestation of intelligence and a funny thing. Five minutes away, on the busy Via Acerbi, ascends designed, also by the artist himself, both as a home, as well as a private museum, Casa di Mantegna. This building, used as a contemporary art exhibition lounge and conference centre, is open and you can enter, to see its unusual circular courtyard. Church of San Sebastiano across the street (the keys to the church can be taken from the Palazzo del Te between 15.00 a 17.00) is the work of Alberti and is known as the first Renaissance church built on the plan of a Greek cross. Currently, the church is neglected and abandoned, and in the words of Nicholas Pevsner, it looks "strangely pagan”. Lodovic II's son described him less delicately: "I couldn't understand, was it supposed to be a church, mosque or synagogue”.
Palazzo del Te
X-III wt.-nd. 9.30-12.30 and 14.30-17.00; IV-IX wt.-nd. 9.00-12.30 and 14.30-17.30; 2500L. The later of the two Gonzaga palaces in Mantua, Palazzo del Te, was designed for Federico Gonzaga and his mistress, Isabelli Boschetta, by Giulia Romano. When the greatest work of this architect, a famous Renaissance pleasure temple was being built, Te, also called Tejeto, it was an island connected to the mainland by a bridge, the perfect place for Federico to relax away from his wife and restrictions, what life in the Palazzo Ducale had to offer. Around the square courtyard, which was once occupied by a maze, are modest, but a well-chosen collection of modern art and a small Egyptian museum, but the main attraction of the palace is, of course, the astonishing decorations of Giulia.
Visiting the palace is like a journey through the world of Giulia's imagination, where little is this, what it seems to be. W get on the Horses, dedicated to the most beautiful specimens from the Gonzaga stud (it was once located on an island), against the illusionist background of false marble, pilasters and bas-reliefs and "visible” through non-existent windows of painted landscapes, horse portraits are presented. The role of the downstream Salotta di Psiche was not communicated in the documents, but the passionate frescoes and the proximity of Federico's bedroom seem to indicate the solution to the mystery. The ceiling paintings tell the story of Cupid and Psyche. They include dizzying views from the perspective of "sotto in su” (from bottom to top) Giulia and the clumsy attempts of such a style by his students. The walls are also decorated with scenes of indecent wedding orgies, in which the drunk participate, drooping, fully or only partially stripped gods and a menagerie of real and mythological creatures. A river god submitting to his natural needs, in the background, was taken either as an allusion to the middle name Giulia, Pippi (Pisser”), or as an encouragement to Federico suffering, according to his doctors, for 'stubborn urinary retention”. Other scenes show Mars and Venus bathing, preparing to rape Olympia, the half-serpent, half-human, Jupiter, and trying to seduce the bull, disguised as a Pasifae cow. The giant Polyphemus looks at everything from the height of the fireplace, squeezing multanki, with which he chanted his love for Galatea, before he murdered her lover.
The destruction of Polyphemus and the other giants by the gods is depicted in the one located further, the extraordinary Sala dei Giganti, which, according to one of the critics, Fredericka Hartta, is "the most fanciful and at the same time terrifying work of the Renaissance”. Like in a modern horror movie, destruction looms from every angle: the poles are breaking, bricks crumble, and crushed by huge chunks of stone, roaring giants seem to fall straight at the onlookers. Another feature, reminiscent of such horror movies, like an earthquake, can be discovered by tapping your foot on the floor, for Giulio created a sound chamber out of this hall.