MUSEO DI CAPODIMONTE, The 16Th Century

At Capodimonte you can admire a vast amount of Renaissance works: part are from the Farnese collection that I've already talked about, and part are from donations and purchases.

Begin with the figures of Father Eternal and the Virgin, which are fragments of a composition Rapahel painted when he was just sixteen. I'd especially like to point out two portraits by Venetian artists: The Portrait of Bishop Bernardo de' Rossi by Lorenzo Lotto, and the Franciscan Friar Luca Pacioli, a renowned mathematician depicted while giving a student geometry lessons. This last work is probably by the Venetian Jacopo de' Barbari, who is little known but no less important.

Two other extraordinary portraits you can't miss were both painted by Sebastiano del Piombo and depict Pope Clement VII. The first shows the Pope shortly after his election, full of energy and a sense of power; the other shows him after the dramatic Sacking of Rome, when German mercenaries devastated the city in 1527. The grizzled beard you see in the second portrait is not random: the pope grew it long as a sign of penance....