Established 2006 Founded 2006 | Website www.arapacis.it Architect Richard Meier | |
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Location Lungotevere in Augusta (corner of Via Tomacelli) – 00100 Rome, Italy Director Claudio Parisi Presicce Similar Museo delle Mura, Museo Barracco di Scultura, Museo Napoleonico, Museo di Roma in Trastevere, Museum of Rome | ||
The Museum of the Ara Pacis (Italian: Museo dell'Ara Pacis) belongs to the Sistema dei Musei in Comune of Rome (Italy); it houses the Ara Pacis of Augustus, an ancient monument that was initially inaugurated on January 30, 9 B.C.
Contents
Structure
Designed by the American architect Richard Meier and built in steel, travertine, glass and plaster, the museum is the first great architectural and urban intervention in the historic centre of Rome since the Fascist era. It is a structure with a triumphal nature, clearly alluding to the style of imperial Rome. Wide glazed surfaces allow the viewer to admire the Ara Pacis with uniform lighting conditions.
The white colour is the trademark of Richard Meier, while the travertine plates decorating part of the building are a consequence of in-progress changes (aluminum surfaces were initially planned), after a design review following controversies with some nostalgia for the previous pavilion that was built in 1938 by the architect Vittorio Ballio Morpurgo.
The challenging design of Meier wants to assert itself in the very hearth of the town, becoming a nerve and transit centre. The complex was intended to include a crosswalk with an underpass linking the museum to the Tiber river; presently the underpass design seems to have been abandoned completely.
History
The building, designed by architect Richard Meier, was inaugurated and opened to the public after seven years of works, on April 21, 2006 (the anniversary of the traditional date of the foundation of Rome).
On the night between May 31 and June 1, 2009, unknown men stained the white outer wall with green and red paint and placed a toilet bowl at the feet of the wall.
On December 12, 2009, a group of activists of Earth First!, during the Copenhagen Summit, colored the water of the fountain green and affixed on the side facing Via Tomacelli a banner saying "Earth First! Act Now". The officers and the employees of the museum intervened immediately removing the banner and emptying the fountain.
Criticisms
The building has collected conflicting viewpoints. The New York Times judged it openly a flop, while the famous art critic and polemicist Vittorio Sgarbi defined it "a Texas gas station in the very earth of one of the most important urban centres in the world", as well as the first step towards an "internationalisation" of the city of Rome. Nonetheless, the ruling was not unanimous at all and, for instance, Achille Bonito Oliva praised Meier's design.
In November 2013 a leaky roof led to unwanted water in the new museum building during heavy rain. Staff members had to use buckets to remove water from the top of the altar.
During one of his first declarations after being elected Mayor of Rome (April 2008), Gianni Alemanno announced his purpose to remove Meier's case, that the Roman right wing always disapproved. However, Alemanno himself later pointed out that the removal was not a priority of his administration.