The following is a city-by-city guide to some of Italy's top art exhibitions:
BELLUNO - Palazzo Crepadona: Titian - The Last Act; this two-part show is also taking place in Palazzo della Magnifica Comunita' di Cadore in Titian's home town of Pieve di Cadore; it gathers some 100 pieces from the final years of the master's long career. The world's leading museums, including Madrid's Prado, The Hermitage of St. Petersburg and The British Museum, have sent works and private collectors have loaned pieces which have never been seen in public before; until January 6.
BERGAMO - Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (GAMeC): The Future of Futurism; the show celebrates Futurism and the influence the movement had on 20th century art; it features 200 works by 120 artists, including paintings by Futurism's main protagonists, Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carra', Gino Severini and Mario Sironi; until February 24.
FLORENCE - Boboli Garden: Gardens of the Ancient World; although Boboli is one of the first and finest examples of formal 17th-century gardens, the exhibit looks at much earlier concepts, from the Mesopotamian world through to Imperial Rome. Over 150 archaeological finds are on display, unearthed at the digs of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and on loan from Italian and foreign institutes around the world. The event, staged in the garden's Limonaia (Orangery), also features a series of reconstructions and models exploring the development of gardens from the 1st millennium BC through to Ancient Rome; until October 28.
MANTUA - San Giorgio Castle (part of the Palazzo Ducale complex): Lucio Fontana Retrospective: Most of the 70 works on show are sculptures but there are also a number of drawings and preparatory sketches by the artist who founded Italy's influential Spatialist movement. The exhibit seeks to strike a balance between Fontana's more traditional works and his abstract pieces; until January 6.
NAPLES - MADRE Contemporary Art Museum: Piero Manzoni, 200 works from bread-and-kaolin Achromes (non-colour) sculptures to fingerprinted eggs by the irreverent creator of 'Artist's Shit'; until September 24.
POSSAGNO - Canova's Home: Cupid; Antonio Canova's celebrated portrayal of teenage Polish prince Prince Henryk Lubomirsky as the mythological god of love has returned to Italy after over two centuries to take part in celebrations for the 250th anniversary of the artist's birth. The marble masterpiece is the star of celebrations in Possagno near Treviso, where the sculptor was born and is buried. Visitors will be able to see the rest of the exhibition at the town's Gipsoteca Canoviana Museum. This part of the show is made up of 29 works focusing on love and beauty; until November 1.
RAVENNA - Church of San Domenico: Mosaics of the East, Tiles on the Road to Damascus; Ravenna, the capital of Roman and Byzantine mosaics, has turned its hand to a fresh clutch of works, restoring a number of priceless designs on loan from Syrian museums. The mosaics were created by artists during the late Roman period, when Syria was a province of the Roman Empire; until November 5.
ROME - Colosseum: In Scaena, 70 ancient Roman theatrical pieces illustrating 900 years of the Roman stage; some 70 objects will be on show including comic and tragic masks, bronze statuettes, mosaics and terracotta vases from museums around Italy as well as the Vatican Museums and Pompeii. From October 3 to February 18.
- Villa Borghese: 50 works by Antonio Canova including 16 large marble pieces; the Borghese's own celebrated Pauline Bonaparte sculpture will be joined by an array of masterpieces including The Three Graces from the Hermitage, the Reclining Naiad from New York's Metropolitan Museum, The Sleeping Nymph from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and Love and Psyche from the Louvre; from October 12 to February 3.
TIVOLI - Hadrian's Villa: the show celebrates a magnificent ancient Roman statue of Emperor Hadrian's wife, Vibia Sabina. The statue is one of 13 looted antiquities that the Boston Museum of Fine Arts recently returned to Italy. One part of the show is devoted to the furnishings, art and architectural features of Hadrian's Villa, the largest and richest Imperial Roman villa ever built; until November 4.
TRENTO - Castello del Buonconsiglio: Gold of the Riders of the Steppes, 400 objects fashioned for nomadic war leaders from the first millennium BC to the Golden Horde in the 13th century, found in tombs in present-day Ukraine; until November 4.
TRIESTE - Salone degli Incanti: Major show on sculptor Marcello Mascherini (1906-1983), comparing him to Italian and European contemporaries like Arturo Marini, Emilio Greco, Lynn Chadwick and Kenneth Armitage; until October 14.
- Revoltella Museum: Felice Casorati: Painting Silence; The retrospective numbers gathers over 100 works on loan from museums and private collections, showcasing the full range of Casorati's styles and themes. It also features a number of paintings by Casorati's contemporaries from the museum's own collection, helping visitors to put his work in context; until November 4.
TURIN - Museum of Antiquities: Ancient Afghan Treasures, over 200 artefacts from four major archaeological sites dating back between 1,700 and 3,200 years. Until September 23.
VENICE - Palazzo Ducale: Venice And Islam, 300 paintings, glassworks, ceramics, metal objects and precious fabrics showing influences of the two worlds between ninth and 18th centuries; until November 28.
VOLTERRA - Palazzo dei Priori: The Etruscans At Volterra, Masterpieces From Great European Museums; this major show in the Etruscan heartland has reunited for the first time splendours from Italy's earliest major civilisation that have been spread across Europe ever since Volterra's tombs and acropolis were excavated in the 18th century. Etruscan jewels, funerary urns, statues, coins and tomb decorations are on loan from the Vatican Museums and other top European museums including the Louvre; until January 8.
