Palazzo Valle

The Palazzo Valle is perhaps the most beautiful baroque buildings designed by the famous architect Gianbattista Vaccarini. Pietro Valle commissioned the project, which began in the first half of the eighteenth century and ended a century later.

The elements that give elegance and impressiveness to this palace are: the shelves with smooth rounded corners, the geometric square fields, the balcony with soft lines where in its gable is the Valle Gravina family’s shield, the limestone in sharp contrast with the dark plaster, the details and finishes and the imposing main gate. At the building’s ground floor there is a workshops’ plan, while in the entrance hall two staircases rise up to the first floor through the courtyard.

In December 2008 the palace was reopened to the public at the behest of Alfio Puglisi Cosentino, who oversaw the restoration with the purpose to create an elegant place where organize events, meetings and contemporary art’s exhibition mostly.

Founded in 2004, Fondazione Puglisi Cosentino is in the inner courtyard, at the second and third floor of the baroque palace. The atrium hosts two permanent works of two exponents of Arte Povera: Giovanni Anselmo and Jannis Kounellis. The courtyard houses, instead, a large metal spiral pillar by Jannis Kounellis and a 6 meters work by Carla Accardi.

The Foundation, which works in favor of ancient, modern, and contemporary art, also promotes relationships between artists and the public in order to contribute to the transformation of the territory.