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Palazzo Bianco has a similar collection of paintings from both local and international artists of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. The highlight for me was ‘Ecce Homo’ by Caravaggio. Although it’s not considered one of his best paintings, you can see how subsequent painters were influenced by him with his use of light, his absolute realism and use of real models, rather than the stylized paintings that had been the vogue before him. The figure of Jesus is a mere youth with just a wisp of a beard. An exotic looking figure behind him appears to cover him with a blanket in a gentle manner, almost sexual. Caravaggio is likely to have been gay, which showed through a lot of his paintings. The figure of Pilate looks grotesque and Peter Robb speculates whose caricature he was intended to be: Gallileo, who was known to Caravaggio and was very unpopular with the church at the time? Maybe not Caravaggio’s greatest work, but still unmistakable.


Palazzo Tursi has a few paintings too, but impresses mainly with it’s actual architecture and an exhibition of antique household items and coins.