Italy under pressure to block villa sale
Italy’s government is under pressure to block the sale of a 16th century villa that comes complete with a Caravaggio.
The Casino dell’Aurora is expected to be auctioned next Tuesday, with its value estimated about ¤471 million (HK$4.16 billion). It is a hefty price tag even for a 30,000 sq ft villa on a 64,500 sq ft lot close to the Via Veneto, and reflects a unique feature: the only known ceiling mural by the Italian master, estimated to be worth at least ¤300 million alone.
Italian politicians, academics and regular citizens have appealed to Prime Minister Mario Draghi to scrap the auction. An online petition urging the government to use European funds to protect “what belongs to Italy” reached more than 32,000 signatures within days.
Under Italian law, the government has a 60-day window to exercise its right of first refusal after a sale agreement to private investors. Italy’s culture ministry has written to Draghi and Finance Minister Daniele Franco to inquire about availability of funds for a state bid, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Also known as the Casino di Villa Boncompagni Ludovisi, the estate was built in 1570, initially as a hunting lodge, and has been in the Ludovisi family since the early 1600s. Among the visitors over the years was author Henry James, who described the villa and its sweeping views in his 1909 memoir, Hours.
Italian
After the 2018 death of Prince Nicolo Boncompagni Ludovisi, the property became the subject of an inheritance fight between Ludovisi’s three sons from his first marriage and his third wife, Texan-born Rita Jenrette Boncompagni Ludovisi.
Ludovisi’s widow was previously married to John Jenrette, a US congressman jailed in the 1980s as part of the bribery scandal known as Abscam.
An Italian court recently ordered that the villa be put up for auction. Any buyer will need to spend another ¤11 million or so for restoration.
“The astronomic asking price doesn’t reflect the fact that this property is bound by the state, and will need to be open to visitors,” art historian and academic Tomaso Montanari wrote in the magazine
Emergenza Cultura. “The government should come up with a fairer evaluation, pay [off] the heirs, and keep the property in public hands.”
Limited public access has been available to the villa under current ownership.
Giacomo di Thiene, president of the Italian Historic Houses Association, said there should be “guarantees about the future use of property” to make sure it stays “culturally relevant, connected with the rest of the community”. The real estate publication
estimates the price
Real Deal could rival the 2015 sale of Hong Kong’s Ho Tung Gardens for HK$5.1 billion, believed to be the priciest residential property sale in history.