Sangiuliano appoints new top-tier museum directors

(ANSA) - ROME, DEC 16 - Eike Dieter Schmidt, the current director of the Uffizi Galleries in Florence and a possible candidate in mayoral elections in the Tuscan regional capital next year, has been chosen by Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano to be the new director of the Capodimonte Museum and Real Bosco in Naples, it emerged late Friday.
    The German-born museum director who recently obtained Italian citizenship will be replaced at the Uffizi by Simone Verde, who moves to Florence from the Pilotta monumental complex in Parma.
    In addition to Schmidt and Verde, two other new directors of top-tier museums in Italy have also been appointed: Renata Cristina Mazzantini at the Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rome and Angelo Crespi at the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan.
    Mazzantini is the current curator of the 'Contemporary Quirinale' project and acts as a consultant to the General Secretariat of the Presidency of the Republic for artistic and architectural profiles.
    Crespi is the current president of the Maga Museum in Gallarate.
    "When I heard the news of the appointment, we were on our way to toast the presentation of an exhibition, and the toast at that point became for this new appointment. I was really very moved," said Schmidt.
    The appointments are the result of an international public selection, even though the candidates were predominantly Italian.
    All the new directors appointed to thetop-tier museums have Italian citizenship. (ANSA).