content and container
“Galleria Nazionale delle Marche” Palazzo Ducale di Urbino

Exhibition space / historic building: how can the exhibition and conservation needs of the Collections of the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche coexist with the protection and enhancement of the architectural asset? This is the question from which to start when rethinking the exhibition route of the Palazzo Ducale, where content and container represent two elements of the highest value, which must always be read as distinct parts of a single narrative.

Starting from an analysis of the critical issues that emerged during the site inspections, examined as points for reflection, we developed a masterplan for the entire Palace/Gallery system, providing an overall view and a comprehensive planning hypothesis, before developing the exhibition route of the piano nobile, to be framed within a more general logic, down to defining, for certain areas of focus, the display, lighting and multimedia supports.

A_Overlap of two realities with different, sometimes conflicting, needs: the rooms of the Palazzo Ducale require general lighting with natural light and openness toward the outdoor spaces, with views over the city and the landscape of which the Palace is an integral part, while the works in the gallery require dedicated lighting able to guarantee correct viewing and conservation of the asset.

B_The exhibition needs of the display system can clash with those of enhancement and conservation of the architectural asset; the display should not hide the decorative apparatus or conflict with the architectural spaces (Photo 2).

C_On the piano nobile there is a single visiting route, with no rest or in-depth areas planned, and some stretches are critical, such as, for example, the forced passage through a corner in the “Sala degli Angeli”.

D_The systems, the result of successive modifications and additions, are obsolete and sometimes intrusive; emergency lights, escape route signage, access points, cameras and security sensors appear as disruptive elements in relation to the architectural and exhibition context (Photos 4, 5, 6).

E_Often in conflict with the decorative elements, preventing them from being properly read, the lighting appears outdated both technologically (energy saving and colour rendering) and aesthetically as a fixture. Accent lighting is present on only a few works, installed in successive phases and not integrated into the display (Photos 4, 6, 7, 8).

F_Although initially conceived with similar elements capable of giving the intervention unity, the display system has undergone inevitable modifications that have layered over time and do not allow for a harmonious and modern reading of the display (Photos 1, 2, 3).

G_Labels and room signage need to be rethought with new, unified graphics for the entire Palazzo Ducale, with text in a format legible for the visually impaired and dedicated texts for children (Photo 8).

H_Furnishing elements such as curtains and seating are dated and worn, and should be replaced with more technical and minimal elements (Photos 4, 7, 8).

In redefining the exhibition spaces of the piano nobile, it is necessary to analyse the entire Palazzo Ducale / Galleria Nazionale delle Marche structure, identifying the accesses, routes, exhibition spaces and services; it must be established where the container becomes the very object of the visit (for example the “Studiolo di Federico”, the state rooms, the underground service rooms and the stables) and where the container serves as a backdrop to the content, and how to make the two realities coexist.

In an attempt to bring order to the Palace's complex museum system, we identified subsystems affecting both the historic building and the exhibition spaces, distinguished by colours indicating the visiting routes, shown in the labels.

Visitors will thus be able to choose their visiting route: deciding whether to explore certain periods in depth or visit the Palace's state rooms, preferring the Gallery's temporary exhibitions to the permanent display, or organising multiple visits on different days.

HISTORIC BUILDING

Rooms of the Palace

The set of state rooms, the decorative apparatus of vaults, doors, windows and fireplaces, but also the service rooms of the basement with the complex sewer system.

Open spaces

Understood as courtyards, gardens, terraces and loggias, as well as the views over the city and landscape enjoyed from the open spaces or from the windows.

EXHIBITION SPACES

The complex of works located on the first and second floors, ranging from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance up to the most recent donations.

Archaeological museum

Currently located on the ground floor, it is planned to relocate it to the basement rooms.

Temporary exhibitions and conference hall

Made up of two areas, one inside the Gallery, with direct access from the “Cortile d'Onore”, the other external, with access from Piazza Duca Federico

Outreach/educational spaces

A new system that uses technology to explain the architecture of the Palazzo Ducale, the history of the Lords of Urbino and its artists, and to describe the Gallery's Collections.

The project to redefine the display of the piano nobile of the Palazzo Ducale can be divided into four main aspects: the exhibition system, the systems/installations, the lighting and the technological display. Four points strongly integrated with one another, to be read as elements of a single display process.

EXHIBITION SYSTEM

A new system conceived as a flexible element capable of adapting to various exhibition needs, but also of giving character and unity to the intervention. A simple panel or case with accent lighting and microclimate control, either wall-mounted or freestanding, the display units are distinguished by having a section inclined at 45° for labels with braille text and QR codes, and a very narrow, and therefore unobtrusive, coloured band with text designed to try to engage children.

The colour of this band corresponds to the routes/subsystems designed to help visitors find their way: gold and light blue, the colours of the building's decorations (the colours of Federico da Montefeltro), corresponding to the “Rooms of the Palace” and the “Galleria Nazionale delle Marche”, characterise the first floor and alternate with the green of the landscape views and the purple that distinguishes the multimedia system.

The inclined section and the coloured band allow for a double reading of the label, with two different reading heights and two different levels of interest: that of the adult, more precise and in-depth, and that of the child, with greater impact in content and colour.

To reconstruct the relationship between the interior of the Palace and the exterior landscape, supports have been placed at some windows inviting visitors to observe the outside view, with indications of what can be seen, historical reconstructions of the views, or other information.

SYSTEMS

The systems should guarantee lighting, security and services without being intrusive to the architectural context; in revising the exhibition system, it is necessarily also necessary to rethink the positioning and possible replacement of obsolete elements.

In an attempt to concentrate them at points that are not very visible to those following the direction of the visit, and to remove as many extraneous elements as possible from the walls, technological columns have been placed near the entrances to house light fixtures, emergency lights, access points, cameras, security sensors and presence detectors for turning on the lights. Compatible with existing provisions, the connections coming from the junction boxes will be concentrated in a single, inspectable and as neutral as possible element, while obsolete components, such as cameras and emergency lamps, will need to be replaced with new systems.

The columns will support the room numbers and signage, currently applied directly to the walls; in addition, at the start of each section, touchscreens with the content of that section will be integrated into them.

LIGHTING

In trying to reconcile the palace's lighting requirements with those of the exhibited works, we developed a lighting system made up of general indirect light able to highlight the architectural elements, and direct accent light on the works, balancing the two types of lighting from time to time according to the needs of the container and the content.

With the exception of a few rooms, the existing diffusers and wall light points will be removed; the display system itself will contain the spotlights for both the lighting of the rooms and that of the collections.

At the top of the technological columns and the display units, projectors will be hidden for the focused lighting of decorative elements — of modest size and with maximum application flexibility, but with high luminous flux and low consumption.

For lighting the works, LED projectors with high colour rendering, on-board dimmers and the option of adding beam shapers, will also be integrated into the display units, with direct light from top to bottom and, in some cases, from bottom to top.

To ensure the lowest energy consumption and the greatest conservation of the artwork, this last type of lighting will be activated by presence sensors. Finally, a system for varying the intensity of the general lighting depending on outdoor light levels could be considered, a system which, however, inevitably implies the installation of new signal cables.

TECHNOLOGICAL DISPLAY

A system that encompasses all the high-tech equipment supporting new multimedia content, through which it will be possible to explore in depth certain themes of the Palazzo Ducale, its Collections, the city of Urbino and the Renaissance in general. There will be both dedicated areas for in-depth study and education where the technological elements will be concentrated, and elements distributed along the route and integrated with the display system.

Located on the various floors, in close relation to the architectural spaces and the works on display, dedicated areas have been identified where the technological elements and digital content will be concentrated, which must take into account the different levels of the public that will use them. In these areas, the presence of trained staff able to guide and assist visitors in using the technological equipment is planned.

In the ground-floor rooms currently used for the “Archaeological Museum”, it is planned to dedicate rooms to first reception, devising a route of discovery of the Palazzo Ducale relating to its historical-architectural aspects, providing more general information points with simple, accessible content and in-depth areas with specialist content organised in a tree structure. Projectors, immersive rooms, touch monitors, but also holograms, augmented-reality stations and real scale models of the palace for the visually impaired — also usable as a base for historicised video mapping — are some of the technologies to be used to create an educational route able to illustrate the relationship between the Palace, Urbino and its territory.

In these ground-floor rooms we chose to locate the most scenographic and high-impact effects, which require particular environmental conditions (such as the absence of light); along the exhibition route, on the other hand, where the relationship between the works on display and the architecture is predominant, we preferred to insert simple informational and in-depth supports.

On the basement floor, information panels will make it possible to illustrate the palace's complex sewer system and the service activities that took place in these spaces.

Along the route of the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche on the first floor, four rooms located in key areas have been identified for dedicated exploration of specific themes:

Finally, on the second floor, a space will be defined dedicated to the Roverate wing, the Della Rovere family, and the Collection works present in these rooms.

In addition to these dedicated areas, technological elements such as touch monitors will be placed along the exhibition route to illustrate the Palace's rooms, explore certain works in depth — such as, for example, the “Ideal City” or “Federico's Studiolo” — or guide visitors' view of the landscape beyond the windows. QR codes will be present on the works' labels, allowing detailed information on individual works to be obtained simply and immediately, directly via one's own mobile device or via tablets provided at the entrance by staff.

In the Soprallogge, currently underused, it is proposed to identify areas with seating where a sensor will activate a directional audio source, able to create a sound suggestion linked to the Renaissance period. Background music will be overlaid with the sounds of horses, voices of court life and other sounds from speakers distributed along the entire corridor, with an enveloping sound coming from different directions, able to bring the atmosphere of the Palace back to life.

Thus, just as the “Cortile d'Onore”, with the opening of new rooms and services, has once again become the heart of the palace and the centre of ground-floor activities, the Soprallogge, with the identification of new alternative routes and rest areas, should regain the role of distribution system it originally had.

The sound experience allows, on the one hand, an additional activity to be added, giving the space a new role, while on the other, it makes it possible not to insert any exhibition element, thus preserving the purity of the space.

With a view to stimulating interaction with visitors and using new communication tools to convey the Gallery's events, we have envisaged a system that both provides information on the works and tracks visitor presence and routes.

Through an intelligent system based on the interaction between bluetooth/wifi signals, every visitor equipped with their own smartphone will be able to receive texts, audio or video illustrating the collections or the architecture in which they find themselves.

Furthermore, through detectors placed at the entrances to the Palace's various areas, it is possible to track accesses and quantify the length of stay, using the Real Time Location System (RTLS) as a monitoring tool.

On exiting, visitors will be able to view on a map the areas they passed through and receive an email with the works seen and an invitation to return to see the other collections.

Furthermore, the system could become a useful analytical tool for monitoring visits and visit times, as well as providing a useful visitor mailing list.