President Mattarella visits revamped MAXXI in Rome.

Italian president Sergio Mattarella visited Rome’s MAXXI Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo on the evening of 5 May for the launch of The place to be, the new display of the museum's permanent collection which triples its exhibition space.

The national museum of the 21st-century arts has undergone a "re-evolution" that makes its "more open, more digital and more welcoming", according to MAXXI president Giovanna Melandri who welcomed Mattarella together with Italian culture minister Dario Franceschini and Lazio governor Nicola Zingaretti.

There is now free admission to the entire ground floor of MAXXI from Tuesday to Friday, and greater emphasis on the museum's external Piazza Alighiero Boetti which features three new large-scale installations by Elisabetta Benassi, Mircea Cantor and Ugo Rondinone.

Inside, Gallery 1 comprises over 60 works of art, architecture and photography, dating from the 1960s to recent times, by important Italian and international artists including Britain's Gilbert & George and South African artist William Kentridge, who is currently in Rome preparing his upcoming opera production Lulu.

Gallery 2 houses temporary exhibitions while there is a new video gallery with extra space for education workshops in the museum which was designed by Zaha Hadid and is located in Rome's Flaminio district near the Auditorium Parco della Musica.

For full details see MAXXI website.