A história
Palazzo Bianco stands on Genoa's Via Garibaldi, the street of marble palaces the city's bankers built for themselves in the 16th century, now a UNESCO site. The Duchess of Galliera gave this one to the city in 1884, and it holds Genoa's picture gallery, some 47 rooms of it.
Genoa grew rich on trade with northern Europe, and its walls show it: alongside the local Genoese masters hang Flemish and Dutch pictures, Rubens and Van Dyck, who both worked in the city, and a tender Blessing Christ by Hans Memling. The most argued-over painting is an Ecce Homo of about 1605, a battered Christ shown to the crowd, long given to Caravaggio though scholars still dispute the hand.
The palace is one of a trio on the street you can see on a single ticket, each a nobleman's house turned museum.
