Municipal Gallery (Casa Bianca)

What I can see

The Municipal Gallery of Thessaloniki is housed in two buildings: the Casa Bianca (or else Villa Bianca, Villa Blanche or Villa Fernandez) and the Toumba annex. It houses more than 1,000 pieces of art, that are works by Greek painters mainly of the 20^th Century (e.g. Epaminondas Thomopoulos, Nikos Engonopoulos, Nikos Chatzikyriakos-Gkikas, Manolis Tombros), works by Thessalonian artists, Greek and foreign engravings, folk portraits and about 60 Byzantine and post-Byzantine icons from the 14^th to the 19^th centuries, most of which were created in the city’s ateliers. It is a building of eclectic style, designed by architect Pietro Arrigoni, who combined elements of Renaissance with Art Nouveau and the traditional architecture of central Europe, as is evident in the design of its roof.

What I can't see

This is the house of Italian-Jewish Dino Fernantez-Diaz. Fernandez’s daughter, Alini, fell in love with the Greek lieutenant Spiros Alibertis, when the city was annexed by Greece in 1912. The strong opposition of the Jewish community to a wedding between a Jew and a Christian forced the couple to elope and marry secretly in Athens. Upon returning to Thessaloniki, they went through happy and sad times. Both survived the Holocaust but Alini’s father and brother were murdered by the Nazis in Italy, where they took refuge. After Alini’s death, the mansion was sold (1965). The subsequent owners sought its demolition, despite it being enlisted as a work of art by the Ministry of Culture. Eventually, the building was expropriated by the Ministry and restored to its original form.

Info

• Address: 180 Vas. Olgas Av.
• Postal Code : 54646
• Phone: +30 2310 425531

Bibliography