Museum of the Ara Pacis

• Name — Museum of the Ara Pacis • Native Name — Museo dell'Ara Pacis • Director — Claudio Parisi Presicce • Architect — Richard Meier • Website — http: www.arapacis.it/ • Established — 21 April 2006 • Location — Lungotevere in Augusta (corner of Via Tomacelli) – 00100 Rome, Italy

• Illustration — The portraits of the Julio-Claudian dynasty placed close to the entry • Illustration — The Ara Pacis inside the museum • Illustration — The fascist-era copy of the Res Gestae Divi Augusti, placed on the back of the museum Designed by the American architect Richard Meier and built in steel, travertine, glass and plaster, the museum is the first major architectural and urban intervention in the historic centre of Rome since the Fascist era. It is a structure with typical modernist features, composed of rigidly geometric shapes and with plain surfaces. Wide glazed surfaces and skylights allow the light to penetrate the central pavilion. The white color is a hallmark of Richard Meier's work, while the travertine plates decorating part of the building reflect design changes (aluminium surfaces were initially planned), resulting from a modification following criticism on the visual impact of the structure on the surrounding urban landscape. The complex was initially intended to include a pedestrian path, allowing a direct connection to the Tiber river via an underpass, which was however never built.

The museum's first building was designed by architect Vittorio Ballio Morpurgo and completed in 1938, during the Fascist era, as part of Mussolini's reconfiguration of Piazza Augusto Imperatore. This location was chosen for the museum due to its proximity to the Mausoleum of Augustus and the newly built surrounding rationalist architecture. In 1996 the then mayor of Rome, Francesco Rutelli, entrusted the American architect Richard Meier with the construction of a new museum, without any architectural competition. Morpurgo's building was demolished and the current building opened to the public, after seven years of works, on 21 April 2006 (the anniversary of the traditional date of the foundation of Rome). During the night of 31 May 2009, unknown persons defaced the white outer wall with green and red paint and placed a toilet bowl at the foot of the wall. On 12 December 2009, a group of activists of Earth First!, during the Copenhagen Summit, colored the water of the fountain green and affixed on the side facing Via Tomacelli a banner saying "Earth First! Act Now". The officers and the employees of the museum intervened immediately, removing the banner and emptying the fountain.