Bergamo, the Conservatory in the former Celestine convent: all the details (and figures) of the plan

It is a new music that could soon resonate in the former Celestine convent in Bergamo. No more Gregorian chants and morning praises, but the music that all the instruments and the study that a Conservatory can produce. And this is because, for some time, the Gaetano Donizetti Higher Institute of Musical Studies has put much more than one eye on the complex of Borgo Santa Caterinadecisively taking the path of purchase and the consequent and necessary restyling.

The Conservatory’s resources are not enough

The silence that surrounds the operation has been ongoing for a few months it is grave, but not enough because, at least in broad terms, something has transpired, and it goes in the direction of the sale. In essence, the Conservatory, looking into the classrooms of the headquarters in via Palazzolo, where there are around 270 students, and in the capacious coffers of the institution, already months ago, it had started a very serious discussion with the ownership of the Institute of the Sacramentine nuns to take possession of the 4,800 square meters of the former convent. This is the first step, addressed on the basis of a financial solidity of the Conservatory capable of ensuring the purchase in the first instance for an estimate which, in 2022, was around 10 million, but which in the negotiation phase followed in recent years could have dropped considerably. Assuming an outlay of approximately 8 million, we arrive at the second step, which would be causing a sort of stalemate in finalizing the deal. The recovery and reuse of the spaces is underlying a profound restyling of the building which, with two cloisters and a church, dates back to the fourteenth century.

The tender intended for Afam

Leaving aside bureaucratic concerns and dictates of the Superintendency, for the storage of classrooms and spaces, the estimate is no joke: further millions are needed, 6 or 7 according to what we learn. Funds that the Conservatory does not have in hand, but which it would have aimed to raise by participating, in 2023, to a ministerial tender intended for Afam, the Italian system of Higher Artistic, Musical and Dance Education made up of institutes spread throughout the national territory. From the more or less favorable outcome of this announcement (the terms of which are not known) the conclusion of an operation will depend which has multiple meanings.

The old rumors linked to Percassi and the ancient bond

The “Celestini case” exploded two years ago when rumors of real estate interests had Atalanta owner Antonio Percassi at the centre. At the basis of the transfer the difficulty of the nuns in supporting the management and necessary maintenance costs had become apparent of a property full of history, but also of building flaws and with obsolete and energy-intensive systems (at the time gas bills were skyrocketing). Last year, for example, it was discovered that the support beams of a wing of the cloister were severely ill, so much so that its collapse is hypothesized, with disastrous consequences for the entire architectural ensemble. To complicate, however, the picture of a possible sale was (and still remains) the ancient bondestablished by the donor Lodovico Goisis in 1940 and that is that the complex would become an orphanage and which in any case had social purposes. A decisive clause, which does not allow any type of commercial and/or residential conversion, but which obliges the buyer to operate in a framework of public and social activity. For this reason, the field of possible buyers is quite limited and has seen the emergence of an institution such as the city Conservatory which has as its primary objectives the study, elaboration, development and diffusion of culture, creation and musical practice.

The Polytechnic of the Arts

A reality that today is experiencing a new season, since the Donizetti Conservatory and the Carrara Academy of Fine Arts merged into a single «Polytechnic of the Arts»as required by law, starting from the current school year after a wait of many years. The declared objective is to create a center of high artistic and musical education. As for the complex, still in 2022 at the first stirrings of a possible sale, the voices of both the FAI and the Bergamo section of Italia Nostra were raised in defense, which had immediately advocated the search for other solutions “also leveraging the constraints existing. The city of Bergamo cannot afford to lose a piece of history.”

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May 26, 2024

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