The Art Gallery originated in 1838, with its seat in the Palazzo della Missione, then the Palazzo degli Studi, when the works of art that had remained in the Municipality after the first Napoleonic suppression were gathered in the Library, to which were then added paintings and frescoes detached from the Municipal Residence and the Cathedral. Considerable development was given to the new institution by Count Pietro Guarini, gonfalonier of Forlì; subsequent and considerable increases were made both for purchases promoted by the municipal administration, and later following the application of the subversive laws of 1866/67.
In 1922 the Library, the Picture Gallery and the Museums were transferred to the present location, built in the XVIII century as the Hospital of the House of God for the Infirm according to the project by Giuseppe Merenda.
The Piancastelli bequest made a substantial contribution to the documentation of 16th century art in Romagna with works by Bartolomeo Ramenghi, Innocenzo Francucci da Imola, Giovan Battista Ramenghi and Luca Longhi.
In the central hall are exhibited the great canvases of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: they are the works of Francesco Albani, Andrea Sacchi, Guido Cagnacci, Cristoforo Serra, Giovanni Francesco Barbieri known as Guercino, Benedetto Gennari, Carlo Maratta, Carlo and Felice Cignani.
