Rome is gearing up for an important retrospective focusing on the groundbreaking effect a trip to Italy had on the works of 19th-century French artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

Rome, February 27 - Curator Kathleen Adler says that Renoir had already turned his back on Impressionism - the movement that made him famous - by the time he took the voyage from October 1881 to January 1882.

She believes the visit was key to his subsequent development as an artist.

''Those few weeks spent in Italy provided a solid base for his new interests, exercising on him an influence that would last for the rest of his life,'' Adler said.

The exhibition at the Vittoriano Complex will showcase 130 works on loan from museums across the world that Renoir painted after his trip, during the last 40 years of his life.

Marble masterpieces by the great Italian sculptor Antonio Canova will go on show in Milan on Saturday for a new exhibition showcasing Italian neoclassical works from the collection of the prestigious Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg.

Milan, February 21 - Seven of the artist's most famous sculptures will be on display at Palazzo Reale, including The Winged Venus, The Repentant Mary Magdalene, The Genius of Death and The Three Graces, commissioned by Napoleon's first wife Josephine in 1812.

The Russian museum has also loaned works by later neoclassical sculptors who took their inspiration from Canova, regarded as the greatest artist of his period.

''This is a series of quite breathtaking masterpieces,'' said curator Fernando Mazzocca. ''No other collection of statues in the world demonstrates with such quantity, variety and quality how Canova and his followers brought back to Italy the prestige of being the land of sculpture, as it had once been in classical times and under Donatello and Michelangelo''.

The following is a city-by-city guide to some of Italy's top art exhibitions:

ALESSANDRIA - Palazzo Monferrato: Le Corbusier, Drawings and Sketches; Italy's first look at the lesser-known side of the great architect (1887-1965); until March 30.

BRESCIA - Museo di Santa Giulia: America! Painting Stories from the New World; 250 works by the 19th-century artists who celebrated the grandeur of the American landscape and life in the West, including Edwin Church, Frederic Remington and Charles Russell; until May 4.

FERRARA - Palazzo dei Diamanti: Joan Miro': The Earth, 80 works in Italy's first retrospective in 25 years; until May 25.

FLORENCE - Palazzo Pitti: Another Beauty; 40 works by 17- century Florentine painter Francesco Furini; to April 26.

- Casa Buonarroti: Michelangelo's Face, 16th-18th century images of an artist who sat for very few portraits; April 22-July 30. FORLI': Museo San Domenico: 'Guido Cagnacci, Protagonist of The 17th Century Between Caravaggio And Reni', 80 works including 44 Cagnaccis; until June 22.

Rome, February 8 - The following is a city-by-city guide to some of Italy's top art exhibitions: ARICCIA - Palazzo Chigi: the Lemme Collection; 130 Baroque works by the likes of Cavaliere d'Arpino, Borgognone and Ludovico Gimignani, until February 10.

ALESSANDRIA - Palazzo Monferrato: Le Corbusier, Drawings and Sketches; Italy's first look at the lesser-known side of the great architect (1887-1965); until March 30.

BRESCIA - Museo di Santa Giulia: America! Painting Stories from the New World; 250 works by the 19th-century artists who celebrated the grandeur of the American landscape and life in the West, including Edwin Church, Frederic Remington and Charles Russell; until May 4.

FLORENCE - Palazzo Pitti: Another Beauty; 40 works by 17- century Florentine painter Francesco Furini; to April 26.

FORLI': Museo San Domenico: 'Guido Cagnacci, Protagonist of The 17th Century Between Caravaggio And Reni', 80 works including 44 Cagnaccis; until June 22.

GENOA - Various venues: The Myth of Garibaldi; five shows and dozens of events until March 2. - Palazzo Bianco: 'From The Cradle To The Altar: Scenes Of Female Life In The Belle Epoque'; until October 10.

MILAN - Palazzo Reale: The Art Of Women, 200 works by 110 artists from 16th to 20th centuries including Sofonisba Anguissola, Artemisia Gentileschi, Camille Claudel, Vanessa Bell, Tamara De Lempicka, Frida Kahlo; until March 9.

- Castello Sforzesco: Leonardo's horse studies including model of equestrian statue destroyed by French invaders in 1499; plus various editions of his Treatise on Painting; until March 2.

Milan, February 7 - An astonishing collection of ancient Greek art is to go on show in the northern city of Mantua next month.

The exhibition will bring together 130 precious artefacts exploring the Italian peninsula's long fascination with Greek art, starting some 2,700 years ago, when the southern part of Italy was colonized by Greek settlers.

''This exhibit is so important because it will collect in a single place works of art that are usually stored far from each other,'' said the show's curator, Salvatore Settis, at a presentation in Milan. ''This will give visitors the chance for an in-depth exploration of a style of art that forms the foundation of our own civilization''.

The show is attracting particular attention as it will feature a number of works that are rarely, if ever, moved from their permanent homes. The Louvre in Paris has agreed to loan out a bronze sculpture of Apollo for the first time, while an athlete's head held in Fort Worth, Texas, is making its first trip back to Europe since being acquired by the Kimbell Museum.

Dario Fo presents new Marco Polo

Nobel winner curator of show of images from 'other world'

Pesaro, June 26 - Italian Nobel prize-winning playwright Dario Fo is the curator of an exhibition of works by a little-known photographer he considers the new Marco Polo.

The show, entitled Altro Mondo (Other World), will feature 56 giant images Adriano Gamberoni shot on his travels around the Third World.

Fo will inaugurate Altro Mondo at this Adriatic city's plush new 'Curvone' multi-storey car park complex on July 21.

"Marco Polo reached China by climbing up and down mountains and crossing seas," said the 81-year-old left-wing playwright.

"Gamberoni has more or less covered the same route, armed with the camera he used to write his version of The Travels of Marco Polo".

Donatello's David to be restored

In first- ever restoration, masterpiece to stay on view

Florence, June 25 - Renaissance master Donatello's famous bronze statue of David is to be restored for the first time ever - under the eyes of visitors to its home at Florence's Bargello museum.

The 'live' restoration of the masterpiece, considered the first major work of Renaissance sculpture, has been made possible thanks to technological innovations such as laser combs invented specially to swipe clean the delicate gold leaf that decorates parts of the work.

The 200,000-euro project will take 18 months, officials said on Monday and it should be finished by the autumn of 2008.

The restoration follows a major check-up on the state of the work, carried out earlier this year.

Ten Pompeii houses reopen to public

Restored treasures include House of Menander

Rome, June 1 - Tourists can once again admire the beauty of 10 ancient Roman houses at Pompeii which have been specially reopened to the public for the summer after restoration work.

The houses are usually off-limits to visitors or, in a few cases, can only be seen by booking in advance.

But they will be open to everyone until the end of October at no extra cost to the price of a ticket to the Roman city, destroyed by the 79 AD eruption of Mt Vesuvius.

Among the most interesting sites is the House of Menander.

It is one of Pompeii's most elegant houses, containing a rich selection of wall paintings, including one of the Greek playwright (342-291 BC) who gives the dwelling its name.

Arts guide: exhibits in Italy

Rome show celebrates Symbolism movement

Rome, June 16 - The following is a city-by-city guide to some of Italy's top art exhibitions.

AREZZO - Museo Statale d'Arte Medievale e Moderna: Piero della Francesca masterpieces including his first painting, a Madonna and Child, missing for 50 years until its recent discovery. Other attractions are diptych of Urbino rulers Federico da Montefeltro and Battista Sforza, which has left the Uffizi for the first time; the Louvre's portrait of Rimini lord Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta; and the Madonna di Senigallia from Urbino. Show combined with tour of surrounding villages where Piero (1412-1492) made his name in the 1430s including Sansepolcro with its Madonna della Misericordia polyptych and Resurrection fresco, and Monterchi's Madonna del Parto; until July 22.

BARLETTA - Palazzo della Marra: Zandomeneghi, De Nittis, Renoir. The Painters of Happiness; Italy's only "true" Impressionist artist, Federico Zandomeneghi, is being celebrated in a new show that also explores his ties with two of his famous contemporaries: Auguste Renoir and Giuseppe De Nittis; until July 15.

Clinton expected in lagoon city on Saturday

A host of glittering top-name celebrities are set to arrive in Venice over the next few days, as the 52nd edition of the Biennial contemporary art festival gets under way.

The festival, which officially kicks off this weekend, will welcome US presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton and British pop star Elton John among many others.

Clinton will attend the inauguration of a restaurant "In Paradiso" in the Biennial Gardens on Saturday, while Elton John has several visits scheduled in the Lagoon City, despite the cancellation of a concert planned in St Mark's Square.

The festival, which boasts the largest cultural menu ever, will showcase works by over 100 artists in 70 different exhibitions.

But in the evenings, press attention will shift to the myriad parties, gala events, dinners and dances planned for coming days.