The 1780 oil on canvas View of the Colosseum from the Palatine Hill by Carlo Labruzzi from the Tsarskoe Selo collection is now on display at Milan's Gallerie d'Italia–Piazza Scala, which is offering the exhibition Grand Tour. Sogno d'Italia da Venezia a Pompei (The Grand Tour: The dream of Italy from Venice to Pompeii) from 18 November 2021 to 27 March 2022.

The Grand Tour was the custom of a traditional trip through Europe that upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank used to undertake between the late 1600s and the mid 1800s. That great journey made Italy the prime destination for European scholars, artists, aristocrats and members of cultured society. A tour of Italy, where classical culture could reach the highest synthesis of nature and history, soon came to be seen as an essential rite of educational passage, as well as an indication of a certain social status.

Key destinations for those travellers were: Rome, the universal and eternal city and the capital of antiquity and Christianity; Naples and the Gulf; Herculaneum and Pompeii, then recently rediscovered; Venice, Vicenza, Florence and later Milan. Also passionate collectors, those voyagers turned Italy into the largest market not only for ancient art but also for contemporary output inspired by memories of antiquity. Painting received a new impetus from the market, particularly for portraiture and landscape, the latter being a genre once considered inferior.

The exhibition at Gallerie d'Italia–Piazza Scala is designed to recreate images of Italy as seen through the eyes of contemporary visitors, a place of heart-rending beauty and a historical snapshot, while focusing on the protagonists of the Grand Tour who created the myth of the “bel paese”. An evocative array of paintings, engravings, sculptures and objets d’art is designed to recreate an image of Italy so beloved and desired by Europe that identified with its common roots, and for which Italy served as the great atelier for centuries.

Organised by Intesa Sanpaolo’s Art, Culture and Historical Heritage and Cultural activities Department/Cultural Initiatives and Exhibition Projects Office in association with Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, the exhibition features numerous loans from public and private collections in Italy and around the world.

Carlo Labruzzi's scarce surviving landscapes were mostly views of Rome and its ancient monuments, as well as pictures with arches and ruins related to or inspired by archeological sites. Passed to Tsarskoe Selo from the Imperial Hermitage in the early 19th century and usually on display in the Waiters' Room of the Catherine Palace, his View of the Colosseum comes from a series of reminiscences about the Grand Tour, which makes it an important piece for the exhibition in Milan.