| LThe gallery is
situated in the splendid palace facing onto the Piazza
del Collegio Romano. Rising on an earlier centre dating
back to the 16th century, the building was erected in
the early 1600's by the Aldobrandini family. It passed
as a gift to the young Olympia, widow of her first
husband Paolo Borghese, it entered the Pamhilj family
after the second wedding of the noblewoman to Camillo,
nepotic cardinal of his uncle, Innocent X. From the
second half of the century, the palace was enlarged
according to the design by Antonio Del Grande, who also
took charge of the later work at the end ofthe 1600's.
In 1731, Gabriele Valvassori modernised the building,
constructing the famous far;:ade in Via del Corso. |
|
The attribution of the Double
Portrait to Raphael, which even if in the past was very much
debated, is now generally accepted. The question of the
identity of the two people is still, however, open.The
humanist, Pietro Bembo, in a letter to cardinal Bibbiena,
says that the humanists from Veneto, Andrea Navagero and
Agostino Beazzano
|
were portrayed by Raphael
in 1516 and he himself possessed a double portrait of the
two. Nevertheless, from the comparison with certain
representations of Navagero and Beazzano, there is a poor
resemblance to the two portrayed, who still remain unknown. |
