Plaster cast collection
Greek sculpture is well represented, from the Archaic age to the Classical period up to Hellenism, thanks to the plaster cast collection. Casts in 1:1 scale, but also smaller copies, reproduce around thirty of the most important artworks of ancient sculpture. For example, there are two versions of the Discobolus, a fragment of the Parthenon frieze depicting the cavalry of the ephebes, the funerary stele of Aristion, the Boy with Thorn, the Apollo of Piombino, the Seated Hermes, the Apollo Sauroktònos, the Nike of Samothrace, the Aphrodite of Milo. All these casts were purchased in the early decades of the twentieth century. They were crafted partly in Milan, in the laboratory of Carlo Campi, who also worked for the Brera Academy, and partly by French artisans; other pieces come from the La Sapienza university collection in Rome.