Without ever renouncing its prestigious medieval past, over the past decades Pistoia has also opened up to the development and promotion of contemporary art, particularly working to increase and valorise the artistic experience of local talents. In a short space of time, in the historic centre too, the city has seen several places flourishing, which skirt the areas of the old city in a typically discrete manner. So we must not be surprised if a Luna nel Pozzo by Gianni Ruffi dominates Piazza Giovanni XXIII, in front of the monumental façade of the Ceppo Hospital, or if the bronze blindfolded figures by Roberto Barni are displayed in a circle in the square called Piazzetta dell’Ortaggio: these are just timid, innovative appearances on the historical scene.

Other places are used for authentic contemporary art exhibitions: first and foremost the eighteenth-century Palazzo Fabroni in via Sant’Andrea, which is used to hold temporary exhibitions and cultural and didactic activities, as well as the permanent contemporary art collection and the Pistoia modern and contemporary art documentation centre, set up in conjunction with the Council, the Province of Pistoia and the Cassa di Risparmio di Pistoia e Pescia with the aim of preserving and ordering documentation on twentieth-century artists from Pistoia, promoting awareness with personal and thematic exhibitions.

Another particularly beautiful place of art is the studio house of Fernando Melani, a versatile abstractionist, who lived and worked for a long time in a small apartment in corso Gramsci, which the Council has renovated, keeping it intact, with works displayed in every room and piles of newspapers stacked on the stairs, just as “Nando” had left them. You can visit the studio in small groups on appointment. In Felceti, the studio house of the master from Pistoia, Jorio Vivarelli, is home to the Foundation with collections of sculptures, graphics and drawings.

Another interesting itinerary of contemporary art set up recently unwinds in the garden of Ceppo Hospital, on the side looking out onto Carmine Square, where the new pavilion for haemodialysis contains works by famous masters, such as Sol LeWitt, Robert Morris, Dani Karavan, Claudio Parmiggiani, Higetoshi Nagasawa and Gianni Ruffi both inside and outside.

These internationally famous artists are also included in the prestigious Gori collection in Celle di Santomato, between Pistoia and Prato, where the owner, Giuliano Gori has set up his own personal “open space” art exhibition, which attracts and enchants enthusiasts from all over the world, along the fascinating paths of a great romantic park and in the beautiful surroundings of the eighteenth-century Fabroni villa and its annexes.

Celle villa is often used for events and displays that are set up, from time to time, in the spaces for art or the open-air theatre in the garden. Just outside Pistoia you can visit a unique contemporary art museum set up in Castagno, a village of medieval origins, which, along its small roads, bays, open galleries and house façades, contains a series of paintings and sculptures that were completed between 1975 and 1980 by artists such as Mino Maccari, Quinto Martini, Venturino Venturi, Jorio Vivarelli and Antonio Bueno. The works are arranged without any precise order, so the spectator s t u m - bles across them by chance, perceiving them almost as a personal discovery.