Auction for Rome's unique Caravaggio villa fails again

By Alvise Armellini

ROME (AA) - An auction for what may be one of the world's most expensive property –​​​​​​​ a villa in central Rome with a unique Caravaggio painting and a price tag of almost €400 million – failed for a second time on Thursday, leaving its fate in the balance.

The Villa Aurora, or Casino dell'Aurora, found no takers as it was offered with a starting price of nearly €377 million. This represented a 20% discount from a first auction held in January, when the villa went on sale for €471 million.

It is now expected to go for auction for a third time, with a further 20% discount.

The 2,800-square-meter villa’s star attraction, Caravaggio’s depiction of Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto, adorns the ceiling of a small room on its first floor, commissioned by first owner Cardinal Francesco Del Monte to decorate his alchemy lab.

It is believed to be the world's only mural by Caravaggio.

The 16th century property also features frescoes by renowned Baroque painter Guercino, a statue of the Greek god Pan attributed to Michelangelo, ancient Roman sculptures, and an internal staircase by Carlo Maderno, the architect who designed the facade of St. Peter’s Basilica.

"It is going to take a billionaire to buy this, not a millionaire," Prince Nicolo's widow, Rita Jenrette Boncompagni Ludovisi, told Anadolu Agency, estimating the villa's annual costs at "$200,000 a year, just for regular maintenance."

The Texas-born princess, present keeper of Villa Aurora's treasures, has a colorful past.

Before joining the ranks of the Boncompagni Ludovisi, one of the most aristrocratic families in Europe, with two popes and several cardinals in its lineage, she was an actress, Playboy cover girl, wife of a scandal-plagued US Congressman, and a real estate broker in New York.

She has lived in Villa Aurora for the past 20 years, partly restoring it with her late husband Nicolo, but is now being forced out by the inheritance feud with her stepchildren.

"Maybe it's time to close this chapter and leave the villa in the hands of a good custodian with the resources to upkeep it," she said.

The princess said she hoped the Italian state might come forward, especially if its price keeps dropping as auctions fail. But the purchase would definitely stretch the budget of Italy's cash-strapped Culture Ministry.

Villa Aurora was originally a hunting lodge, part of a larger residence, Villa Ludovisi, that was knocked down in the late 19th century to build the ritzy Via Veneto neighbourhood, which in the 1960s became the backdrop to Rome’s "Dolce Vita" nightlife.

Villa Ludovisi used to be Rome’s largest private estate, visited by literary lions such as Goethe, Stendhal, Nikolai Gogol, and Henry James. Before it was destroyed, it served as the winter residence of the official mistress of the first king of Italy, Victor Emmanuel II.