In Torri del Benaco, on Lake Garda, the second edition of «Turris Antiqua» combines cultural tourism and the valorization of local heritage
In the city of Torri del Benaco, art meets history and becomes a tool for enhancing the territory. From 12th to 21st Junethe Scaligero Castle hosts the second edition of Turris Antiqua, the most important antiques market exhibition on Lake Garda, in one of the symbolic places of the Veronese lake. The event, organized by the Municipality with the patronage of the Veneto Region and the Province of Verona, brings together around 20 exhibitors from all over Italy. A journey that passes through paintings, sculptures, furniture, ceramics, glass and historical artefacts, from the medieval age to the first decades of the twentieth century, with some forays into modern and contemporary art.
At the origin of the exhibition
Turris Antiqua was born from a precise vision: making antiques a tool for telling the story of the territory. Not a simple commercial showcase, therefore, but a cultural project capable of transforming the castle into a living space where art, memory and local identity meet. «Torri del Benaco is a place where history does not remain immobile: it continues to dialogue with the present», declares the mayor Stefano Nicotra. «Turris Antiqua was born precisely from this vision: to transform our heritage into a meeting space between art, memory and contemporaneity».
The historic eighteenth-century lemon house
This year’s edition is marked by an extraordinary event: the reopening of the castle’s lemon house, the most important on the Veronese side of the lake, built around 1760 and considered one of the most precious testimonies of the Garda citrus growing tradition.
The inaugural ceremony was attended by the Minister of Tourism Gianmarco Mazzi, who underlined the value of an intervention capable of combining protection of historical heritage and contemporary technology.
The most valuable works of the exhibition
The exhibition stands out for the quality and variety of the works. Luigi Minelli’s Antichità Marcelli arrives from Gubbio, with a precious piece «Page» by Giandomenico Tiepolo from the end of the eighteenth century and two «Madonnas with Child» attributed respectively to Carlo Crivelli and Raffaellino del Garbo. Also of notable value is the pair of polychrome ceramic busts depicting Isabella d’Este and Ippolito d’Este, made by the Bolognese manufacturer Angelo Minghetti.
The valorisation of the Garda area
In short, the importance of Turris Antiqua goes far beyond the simple exhibition event. The event is part of a broader strategy of cultural promotion which involves numerous municipalities in the area and aims to consolidate the role of Garda as a destination capable of combining the naturalistic offer with an artistic proposal of the highest level. At a time when the antiques sector is facing profound transformations, Turris Antiqua demonstrates how artistic heritage can still generate interest and contribute to construction of curious and aware tourism. For Torri del Benaco, it is an investment in the identity of the territory, but also an opportunity to tell Garda through its history, its works and its places of the soul.
