TURIN, ITALY.- Within a year of the launch of the winter Olympics, in February 2006, the city of Turin takes particular care of its cultural agenda. In the newly refurbished Palazzo della Promotrice, an ambitious exhibition of 150 paintings, including masterpieces of Courbet, Monet and Gauguin, gives an insight of things to come.

When snow gives light - If the Old Masters like Bruegel did sometimes depict snow, it rarely became the sole subject of their paintings. It is only after the 1850s, when the artists decided to work on the spot, that snow rose to prominence. It appeared as a perfect tool to render all the potentialities of light. From Russia to France, from Germany to Italy, the curators have conceived the exhibition as a stroll around Europe. Smaller countries like Slovenia, Finland or Hungary have not been omitted.

Snow across Europe - The first section comprises about one hundred works on the theme of snow in Europe, excluding France. It spans from urban settings by German painters -View on the Zoo by Max Lieberman - to the natural landscapes beloved by the Russians - Spring by Isaak Levitan - and the Swiss The Avalanche by Ferdinand Hodler. Scandinavia is represented by artists like Gallen-Kallela and Carl Larsson who were the gifted interpreters of still prevalently rural societies. Even Italy, seldom associated with cold weather and winter, gave interesting contributions, with the divisionist Giovanni Segantini or Giovanni Fattori, from the Macchiaioli movement.

Snow in France - The second section is entirely dedicated to French painting and opens with an impressive series of nine works by Gustave Courbet, inspired by his native land, Jura. The name of Edouard Manet comes as a surprise because he left extremely few landscapes like this Effet de neige à Petit-Montrouge. On the opposite, Claude Monet widely worked on the subject, leaving his famous haystacks or his series of Dégels (thaws). On show are 12 paintings by the Impressionist artist, including some that he realized during a trip to Norway in 1895. Along Pissarro, Sisley, Caillebotte or Albert Lebourg, other highlights include four works by Paul Gauguin and the Garden of the Presbytery at Nuenen, a rarely seen Van Gogh belonging to the Armand Hammer Collection.