2024 - Europe: 07/05/24

17 June 2024 - Florence Italy (Uffizi again, Pitti Palace and the Duomo)

We went back to the Uffizi Gallery to see the first floor exhibits which had collections from Ruebens, Caravaggio and other well known Italian painters. Next to the Louvre, the Uffizi Gallery is the most extensive collection of famous art pieces that I have seen. We had a guided tour of the Pitti Palace, the home of the Medici family for many, many years. This art museum is different in that the paintings are in situ, meaning they are placed in a room as part of the decor of the room, like you would hang paintings in your home. Of course, I don’t know anyone that has a real Donatello and Botticelli hanging on their walls, but the Medicis had many. And the rooms were beautiful - like Versailles beautiful. Behind the palace are the Boboli Gardens. We saw a portion from the palace, the part that was designed to be a formal Italian garden. The rest of the park is huge. Nice to see some greenery in the city. There isn’t much anywhere else because all the buildings are so densely packed. Then, just as the days are getting warmer and warmer, we headed back over to the Duomo to tour the insides of the church and the baptistery. There is a nearby museum that has the real sculptures and artwork. Replicas are in the church and baptistery. Standing outside on the pavement was a scorcher, so we tried to find what shade we could (along with everyone else). Pretty crowded.

Caravaggio’s The Medusa depicts the Gorgon at the moment she realized her head had been cut off. It was painted on a shield and given as a gift to the Medici family. The face is a self-portrait of Caravaggio.

El Greco’s The Tears of Saint Peter

There were several rooms of self-portraits covering 600 years, interestingly, sponsored by the Pritzker family of Chicago to the tune of 1.5 million euro. It is the oldest and largest collection of self-portraits. This is of Rembrandt.

Peter Paul Ruebens self-portrait.

I think it is kind of cool to put a face to the artwork. This is Bernini. I think my favorite sculpture of all time is his Daphne and Apollo which I saw at the Borghese Gallery in Rome.

This is the woman that bought Pitti Palace and moved her family from the Palazzo Vecchio. Eleonara di Toledo was from Spain. This painting looked so realistic, you could almost touch the velvet of her gown. Unfortunately, the little boy, Giovanni, died quite young, as did several of her other children. She, in turn, died fairly young, only a few years after finishing the rebuild and furbishment of the Pitti Palace.

Huge urn from the 2nd half of the first century BC

Caravaggio’s Sacrifice of Isaac

Carava

Our tour to the Pitti Palace was early and beat the tourists to the Ponte Vecchio bridge. We were the only ones in the middle of the bridge!

When the Medici’s had the passage built from the town hall (Palazzo Vecchio) to the Pitti Palace, they crossed over the Ponte Vecchio bridge. At the end is a tower owned by another powerful family. That family would not let them build the passage through the tower, so the Medici’s built around it. Our guide told us that the passageway is so narrow here, that you have to walk sideways to get through.

The Pitti Palace is huge, but its exterior is not very exciting. Especially when compared to what is inside.

A view of the plaza in front of the palace. There are no ornate fences or moats to protect the palace.

Inside the palace is a huge patio. The column style is unique with the horizontal lines. For one of the son’s weddings, this ground floor was sealed and filled with water. A full size ornate boat floated on the newly created lake!

The patio contained a water fountain in the form of a grotto. Part of the ceiling had plaster work to resemble hanging vines.

We saw this style of decorating everywhere in Florence. Found out from the guide that it is called Grottesch and is patterned after the basement ceiling’s of Nero’s palace which was uncovered in the 1500s. It usually had playful themes and highly decorated floral fillings.

A view from the palace into Boboli Gardens. This area was featured in the movie, Angels and Demons, along with the Medici passageway.

The chandeliers in this white room are huge and beautiful.

You can get an idea of how the Pitti Palace displays their paintings. It is more by balancing the size of the pictures, then it is by collecting all the painting of one artist or arranging by theme. Like wallpapering by paintings.

Many rooms had detailed ceiling frescoes.

And in the middle of the geometrically arranged paintings - a Boticelli.

There were several tables with very ornate mosaics on the top.

There were also collections of Roman sculptures. I like this one because it was partially made of alabaster which has a glow when the light hits it just right.

There were rooms of this artwork in the palace. Reminded me of the Vatican Museums endless rooms.

Lorenzo II Magnifico, a Medici who became a pope (Leo X)

The front of the Duomo is very ornate. It is primarily Gothic with some Romanesque and Renaissance elements. The marble coverings are beautiful. It took two centuries to build it so it makes sense that the different architects had their influences.

These sculptures are all replicas. The real ones have been removed from the elements and are on display in the nearby museum.

The dome is one of the largest in the world (it remains the largest brick dome.) It was designed and built by Brunelleschi. There is a statue of him in the plaza looking up at the dome. He used some pioneering techniques of constructing the dome which allowed the building to not have to use flying buttresses for strength.

It seems like church’s in Italy come with towers and baptisterys.

Some of the carvings on the Duomo’s walls were domestic, farming or scientific scenes. Different from other churches, where everything has a religious theme.

The dome of the Duomo was heavily detailed. Painted by Vasari and Luccari, it depicts the Last Judgement.

This pattern would make a beautiful quilt.

The Baptistery ceiling was under restoration, but we were able to see other gold mosaics on the walls and alcoves.

Everything is mosaic!

The floors are just as beautiful as the walls. This is all inlaid marble.

The Opera del Duomo Museum contains most of the original art and sculptures designed for the Duomo. Totally reworked in 2015, I found the layout and content amazing. It is easily one of the best museums we have seen in Italy. They designed a structure to replicate the facade of the Duomo before its last remodel and put the sculptures where they would have been displayed.

Since the Duomo was paid for by merchants and working people, the facade contains scenes paying homage to them. This particular one shows Galileo using his telescope.