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The rooms of Palazzo Besso

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Chinese living room

Not large, but very precious, is the "Sala dei Lumaconi" as it is defined in the maps of the Strozzi Archive, then the Chinese Living Room for the panels painted on large frames that almost completely cover the walls, of oriental inspiration with flowers and animals. especially birds on a gold background. To admire is also the wooden coffered ceiling painted with marine motifs, such as shells and corals with infinite shapes, intense colors and various assemblages, and inspired by the famous collection of Naturalia by Leone Strozzi. The frieze on canvas, with seascapes and scenes of naval maneuvers in the center, and at the corners, pairs of tritons and nereids with cherubs, like the ceiling, should date back to the end of the 1600s and is attributed to Giacinto Calandrucci and his school, also if it was certainly restored in the nineteenth century, when it was adapted to the new dimensions of the room.

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In the seventeenth-century landscape there are often representations of ports and marine views, in which architectures are inserted poised between real and fantasy views. In this case, the presence of the Strozzi coat of arms on one of the buildings could be a tribute to the client family.

Finally, in the room there are precious Thai-made carved wooden furnishings, gifts from the royal family of Siam to Salvatore Besso, son of Marco Besso who had witnessed the coronation of Maha Vajiravudh, Rama VI, as a correspondent for the Roman newspaper in Bangkok in 1911. "The Tribune".

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"Sala dei Lumaconi" as it is named in the papers of the Strozzi Archive, then Chinese Living Room for the panels painted on large frames that almost completely cover the walls

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"Who can distinguish the weeping held hidden by the fan in autumn? In the sky the bright moon awaits the emperor."
Text written in Chinese ideograms, it is an
incomplete quotation, perhaps from memory, of two lines of a poem by the Chinese poet Wang Changling (698-765) of the Tang Wang dynasty.

some details of the panels on the walls

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In the seventeenth-century landscape there are often representations of ports, marine views with atmospheres or shipwreck scenes, in which architectures poised between real and fantasy views are inserted

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Salotto Cinese

Finally, in the room there are precious Thai-made carved wooden furnishings, gifts from the royal family of Siam to Salvatore Besso, son of Marco Besso who had witnessed the coronation of Maha Vajiravudh, Rama VI, as a correspondent for the Roman newspaper in Bangkok in 1911. "The Tribune".

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