Stellario Baccellieri has been Caffè Greco’s artist in residence for more than 40 years, capturing the conviviality of Rome’s oldest coffee bar on canvas every day and painting the portraits of its illustrious patrons. “I’ve seen everything and everyone,” he said on a recent visit by the Guardian, as he pointed towards a closed-off area where the Italian capital’s cultural and political elite would meet to debate in bygone times. “The most important people have been here … this place is not only a bar, it’s a museum.”

Baccellieri’s role and the fate of Caffè Greco, which opened in 1760 on the Via Condotti, close to the Spanish Steps, now hang in the balance as a date looms for the bar’s management company, Antico Caffè Greco, to leave the property.