Visitart n3 eng

photo Francesca Anichini

the green issue

exhibitions museums academies foundations villas gardens libraries universities churches palaces concerts restoration events publications conferences childrenĘźs activities

florence

10,00 â‚Ź

n.3 april-september 2011

a half-yearly magazine on the arts

Poste Italiane s.p.a. - Spedizione in Abbonamento Postale - D.L. 353/2003 (conv. in L. 27/02/2004 n° 46) art. 1, comma 2, DCB Firenze In caso di mancato recapito inviare a Firenze CMP per la restituzione al mittente previo pagamento resi

contents 3• april-september 2011 4

Palazzo Pitti

36

Medici Villas

8

Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore

38

Bardini Villa and Garden

10

The Uffizi

40

Academies and Foundations

13

The Uffizi Department of Prints and Drawings

42

Natural History and Anthropology Museum

14

Libraries

44

Stibbert Museum

16

The Accademia

45

Casa Buonarroti

17

The Bargello

45

Horne Museum

18

Opificio delle Pietre Dure and the Restoration Laboratories

45

Richard Ginori Museum

20

Cenacoli, Fresco cycles, Oratories

46

Galileo Museum

21

San Marco Museum

46

Museum of Mathematics

22

Museo degli Innocenti

47

Alinari National Museum of Photography

22

Orsanmichele

47

Fashion Museums and Archives

23

Santa Croce Monumental Complex

48

Fiesole Museums

23

Medici Chapels

50

Foreigners in Florence

24

Civic Museums

52

Children

26

House Museums

56

Music in the city

28

Archaeological Museums

57

Books about town

30

Palazzo Strozzi

58

In Tuscany

31

Palazzo Medici Riccardi

60

Architecture walks

32

In the now

green dates this spring Lectio Magistralis given by Gilles Clément piazza San Marco Sala del Rettorato 5 pm 4 April Landscape architect, engineer, agronomist, botanist and entomologist Clément gives the first lectio magistralis of the 2011 season of the Fondazione Florens, where he presents for the first time in Italy his latest book, translated into Italian, Il Giardino in movimento.

19th Giornata Fai di Primavera 26-27 March www.giornatafai.it

Ruralia Fair of Agriculture and the Rural Life last weekend of May (see p. 37) Parco mediceo di Pratolino Villa Demidoff www.provincia.fi.it/pratolino

Daffodil Festival every weekend from 27 March to 1 May Villa La Pescigola, Fivizzano (Massa) www.villapescigola.com

Flowers and plants exhibition 25 April-1 May Giardino dell’Orticoltura, Firenze www.societatoscanaorticultura.it

Toscana esclusiva.

Open courtyards and gardens 28-29 May www.adsitoscana.it

COMING SOON Firenze card New to Florence is a single ticket that includes use of public transport and access to 33 Florentine museums for 72 hours from its activation.

No more booking and no more queues.

For information www.firenzecard.it

13th Culture Week 9-17 April free entry to all State monuments, museums, archaeological areas, archives, libraries.

Events throughout Italy www.beniculturali.it

Festival of Europe 6-10 May organised by the European University Institute, a rich cultural programme transforms Florence into the capital of Europe for five days www.festivaldeuropa.eu

European Museum Night 14 May Night-time opening of museums and institutions throughout Europe, with free admission for visitors www.lanottedeimusei.it

International Iris Competition in its 55th year 9-14 May Giardino dell’Iris, Firenze (open from 25 April to 20 May) www.irisfirenze.it

I profumi di Boboli 5th fair of scented flowers and products 19-22 May www.profumidiboboli.org

Artigianato e Palazzo The Craftsmen fair in its 17th year 13-15 May Giardino Corsini, Firenze www.artigianatoepalazzo.it

Infiorata di Scarperia last Sunday of May Scarperia (Firenze) www.prolocoscarperia.it

Murabilia market for amateur gardeners 2-4 September Mura urbane di Lucca www.murabilia.com

useful numbers Regione Toscana 800 860070 Provincia di Firenze 055 055 ADSI Toscana 055 212452 FAI Firenze 055 2741029

calendar here listed is only a selection of events reported in VisitArt For others events please refer to the magazine and to www.visitartfirenze.com

from 4 March Miniature e testi classici da Bisanzio alla Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana (p. 14) ♣ opening on 8 March Figure, Memorie, Spazio. Disegni da Fra’ Angelico a Leonardo at the Uffizi Department of Prints and Drawings (p. 13) ♣ from 12 March Picasso, Miró, Dalí. Giovani e arrabbiati the new exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi (p. 30) ♣ le collezioni degli Uffizi a Beijing from 12 March, Shenyang from 15 June (p. 12) ♣ until May the Centro di Cultura Contemporanea Strozzina supports the project Open Studios, offering the possibility to visit the studios of 18 artists (p. 34) in the series “La città degli Uffizi” the exhibition on Giovanni Martinelli opens in Montevarchi on 19 March (p. 10) ♣ Restituzioni at Palazzo Pitti - restored works on show from 21 March (p. 4) ♣ from 22 March, following restoration, the Tabernacolo dei Linaioli, Beato Angelico’s celebrated work, is on show at the Biblioteca Monumentale di San Marco (p. 21) ♣ until July Famiglie a Palazzo Strozzi, a rich programme of activities for families with children aged 3 and over, while at the Strozzina there are many activities for discovering contemporary art on the first weekend of each month (p. 54) ♣ Palazzo Medici Riccardi and the contemporary: from 25 March the works of Antonio Vinciguerra (p. 31) ♣ 26 March the new Parco Archeologico di Carmignano opens (p. 29) ♣ an exhibition on Pellegrino Artusi at the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale from 30 March (p. 15) ♣ until May workshops for children and families at the Annigoni Museum, Villa Bardini and Mathematical Sundays at from 2 April the Civic Archaeological Museum in Fiesole the Museum for Mathematics continue (p. 52-53) hosts the exhibition Gli Etruschi e il Sacro. Da Fiesole a Sovana (p. 49) ♣ Disegni di Leonardo e Michelangelo a confronto, exhibition hosted by the Casa Buonarroti from 5 April (p. 45) ♣ works by Antonio Manzi on exhibition for the first time at the Basilica di Sant’Alessandro in Fiesole from 9 April (p. 49) ♣ Videolibrary at EX3 until 10 April (p. 32) ♣ the history, culture and spirituality of the Sioux at Palazzo Medici Riccardi in the exhibition Wolakota from 11 April; Pietro Annigoni until 12 April (p. 31) ♣ from 16 April Böcklin, de Chirico e Nunziante on exhibition in Fiesole (p. 49) ♣ Titian’s La Bella restored is the fulcrum for the new exhibition at the Palatine Gallery in Palazzo Pitti from 18 April (p. 5) ♣ Benozzo Gozzoli e Cosimo Rosselli on exhibition in Castelfiorentino from 30 April (p.

11) ♣ 30 April the exhibition on the painter Enzo Faraoni and Dall’icona a Malevich at the Gallery of Modern Art For the Love of God at Palazzo Vecchio (p. 24) and the exhibition on the Ghirlandaio family close (p. 4) (p. 10) closes on 1 May ♣ the return of the Fabbrica Europa project: a programme of theatrical events, concerts, dance, workshops and debate (p. 33) ♣ from 5 May Dino Caponi and from 12 May Ottone Rosai on exhibition at the Palazzo Medici Riccardi (p. 31) ♣ antique maps on show at the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale from 7 May (p.

15) ♣ the EX3 exhibition Suspense. Sculture sospese closes on 8 May (pp. 32-33) ♣ from 11 May L’acqua, la pietra, il fuoco, the Bargello celebrates the fifth centenary of the birth of Bartolomeo Ammannati (p. 17) ♣ European Museum Night returns on 14 May (p. 21) ♣ Palazzo Pitti hosts the first exhibition on the late period of the Opificio from 17 May and Il Tesoro del Cremlino from 27 May (p. 5) ♣ from 20 to 22 May Keep an ear on…, international conference on the landscape of sound organised by Tempo Reale, FKL and EX3 (p. 32) ♣ 21 May Identità virtuali opens at the CCC Strozzina (p. 34) ♣ from 31 May at the Accademia the first exhibition devoted to Lorenzo Bartolini during the summer months the sculptures of Antonio Crivelli are on display in the archaeological (p. 16) park of Fiesole (p. 49) ♣ Morgante by Nicola Lo Calzo, a new exhibition at the Alinari Museum from 9 June (p. 47) ♣ on 10 June the exhibition on Antonio Berti at the Casa Siviero opens (p. 27) ♣ at the Fortezza da Basso another appointment with Pitti Uomo (14-17 June) and Pitti Bimbo (23-25 June) (p. 32) ♣ at the Uffizi from 14 June the exhibition Vasari, gli Uffizi e il Duca celebrates the fifth centenary of the maestro’s birth (p. 10) ♣ the creations of Umberto Mariani at Palazzo Medici Riccardi from 16 June (p. 31) the Camaldolesi on exhibition at the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale (p. 15) ♣ Notti dell’archeologia, a performance in the garden of Casa Siviero on 9 July (p. 27) in September the Centro Pecci hosts Videominuto and Athos Ongaro’s exhibition Abracadabra (p. 34) ♣ the dialogue continues between the Comune di Fiesole and the masters of architecture with the exhibition Giovanni Michelucci. Disegni inediti at the Civic Archaeological in Fiesole (p. 49) ♣ Preziosi tesori in villa until 10 September at the Villa medicea della Petraia (p. 36) ♣ from 24 September Palazzo Strozzi hosts masterpieces by Botticelli, Beato Angelico, Pollaiolo and others in the exhibition Il denaro e la bellezza (p. 30)

march

april

may

june

july

september

palazzo pitti

leonora di Toledo, wife of Cosimo I, bought and greatly extended Palazzo Pitti to create a light and airy residence for the large ducal family and surrounded it with superb gardens. The palace was linked by the Vasari corridor to the Uffizi and Palazzo Vecchio, which remained the official power base and seat of government. In the course of its history the building has been home not only to the grand dukes, but also to Italy’s royal family. Today it houses several impressive collections of paintings, sculptures and artefacts, in perfectly preserved surroundings. This prestigious structure now houses seven museums.

E

a green walk Palazzo Pitti and Villa Bardini are connected via the Boboli Gardens.

There is free access for residents.

See p. 39

piazza Pitti www.polomuseale.firenze.it/palazzopitti

The Palatine Gallery and Royal Apartments

Silver Museum

The Palatine Gallery was created in the late 18th and early 19th century by the Lorraine family to exhibit masterpieces mainly from the Medici collections, and houses works by Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio, Rubens, Pietro da Cortona and other Italian and European masters of the Renaissance and the 17th century. The 14 rooms of the Royal Apartments, formerly the private residence of the sovereigns, are decorated with furnishings, fittings and works of art dating from the 16th to the 19th century and are open to visitors. open: Tuesday to Sunday 8.15-18.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December The Royal Apartments are closed in January for general maintenance

Gallery of Modern Art

The Gallery shows paintings and sculptures mainly by Italian artists, dating from the late 18th century to the First World War. The works range from the neoclassical period to Romanticism and include a fine collection of the Macchiaioli artists. open: Tuesday to Sunday 8.15-18.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

Carriage Museum

The museum houses fine examples of carriages used by the Lorraine and Savoy courts as well as antique harnesses for horses. The oldest carriage is an 18th-century rocaille coupé. open only on request photo Francesca Anichini

The museum is named after the silver that belonged to the collections of the bishops of Salzburg, brought to Florence in 1815 by Ferdinando III of Lorraine. The museum also contains the famous Medici Treasury as well as elegant Chinese and Japanese porcelain, collected by the Medici from the 15th century onwards.

Costume Gallery

The Gallery was founded in 1983 in the Palazzina della Meridiana. Dedicated to the history of fashion from the 18th century to the present day, it houses clothes, accessories and jewels as well as stage costumes. There is also an important collection of papers, including archive documents, sketches and drawings.

Porcelaine Museum

Located in the 18th-century “Palazzina del Cavaliere”, the museum houses the finest European porcelain collected by Pietro Leopoldo and Ferdinando III, alongside porcelain removed from the historic residences in Parma, Piacenza and Sala Baganza.

Costume Gallery Silver Museum Porcelaine Museum open: every day, 8.15-16.30 from November to February, 8.15-17.30 March and October after official summer time sets in, 8.15-18.30 in April, May, September and October, 8.15-18.50 from June to August closed: first and last Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

calendar of exhibitions april-september 2011 Dall’icona a Malevich.

Capolavori dal Museo Russo di San Pietroburgo Gallery of Modern Art until 30 April

4

Russian art from the 16th century to the avant-garde movements of the early 20th century, in 40 paintings from the prestigious museum.

Starting with the icons, the most celebrated expression of Russian art, the exhibition devotes great attention to the 18th century, up to the work of Nesterov, Serov, Vrubel, Kandinsky, Malevich, Goncharova, Filonov, and many others.

The exhibition is in collaboration with the Russian Ministry of Culture and the Italian Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali.

Natura e verità nella pittura di Enzo Faraoni Gallery of Modern Art until 30 April An exhibition organised in association with the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno with over 70 works representing the artistic career of this important figure in 20th-century art: a painter and engraver who grew up in the countryside of Montelupo Fiorentino. The dominant themes of his production range from self-portraits and female subjects to still lifes and paintings that reflect his interest in the plant world.

Vinum nostrum Arte, scienza e miti del vino nelle civiltà del Mediterraneo antico Silver Museum until 15 May Sculptures, frescoes, mosaics and artefacts recount the history of the grapevine and of wine, as well as the important influence they exerted over ancient culture: from the origin of wine-growing in the Near East, up to the production and widescale diffusion achieved by the Romans. The exhibition is curated by the Museo Galileo and the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Napoli e Pompei.

Restituzioni Palatine Gallery 21 March-5 June Restituzioni, the programme of restoration of works of art funded by the Intesa Sanpaolo bank, has reached its 15th edition; the now completed restoration of about 80 works is documented by the itinerant exhibition with a first stop in Florence. On display are sculptures, archaeological finds like small bronzes, ceramics and jewels, canvases and painted wood panels, carved ivories and objects of the goldsmith’s art, tapestries and models in terracotta. The restored Florentine works include the Della Robbia frieze from Poggio a Caiano and the Tabernacolo dei Linaioli, which can be seen in the exhibition staged at San Marco.

aprilaprilaprilaprilmaymaymaymayjunejunejunejunejulyjulyju

palazzo pitti

A gardener’s tools

focus / Boboli

Gardens

Before the advent of modern technology, until around 1950, these tools were used almost daily and were associated with crafts and professions that guaranteed their production and maintenance. Bill-hooks, clippers and cutting tools were forged and manufactured by blacksmiths and tinsmiths who assisted the gardeners, plumbers and other specialist workers. For every single necessity, these craftsmen of wood and metal created unique little masterpieces in the forge.

Behind the Pitti Palace lie the magnificent Boboli Gardens, a veritable open-air museum, filled with antique and Renaissance statues, and enhanced with grottoes and grand fountains. The grounds were first laid out at the time of the Medici, creating the formal Italian garden that would become a model for many of the European courts.

❍ watering can

Ivo Matteuzzi Gardener, Boboli Gardens

❍ pliers ❍ hand scythe

open: every day, 8.15-16.30 from November to February, 8.15-17.30 in March and October after official summer time sets in, 8.15-18.30 in April, May, September and October, 8.15-19.30 from June to August closed: first and last Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

❍ water pipe head

❍ cutting tool

❍ cutting tool

❍ drill

❍ gimlet ❍ spade

❍ axe

❍ siphon photo Francesca Anichini

calendar of exhibitions april-september 2011 “Quella Donna che ha la veste azzurra” La Bella di Tiziano restaurata Palatine Gallery 11 April-10 July The centrepiece of the exhibition is La Bella, one of Titian’s most celebrated paintings, restored by the Opificio delle Pietre Dure. The exhibition includes the Woman in a Fur (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), and the Portrait of Francesco Maria della Rovere (the Uffizi) and its preparatory drawing; also on display are pieces of blue damask from the Bargello, together with manuscripts and printed texts including the treatise De li habiti antichi et moderni di diverse parti del mondo by Cesare Vecellio.

Dal fucile al pennello: artisti combattenti Gallery of Modern Art 14 April-12 May

La grafica a soggetto militare di Giovanni Fattori Gallery of Modern Art 31 May-10 June The two exhibitions have been arranged for the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of Italian Unification.

Dagli splendori di corte al lusso borghese.

L’Opificio delle Pietre Dure nell’Italia unita Gallery of Modern Art 17 May-11 September After 1861 the Medicean craft workshops, with the new name of Opificio delle Pietre Dure, became famous throughout Europe; from being a laboratory at the service of the court it now opened to a private clientele, while by the end of the century it was devoted to the conservation of the artistic heritage. In the first exhibition on its late period, a rich assortment of table-tops, caskets, sculptures and pieces of furniture shows the vivid colours and the decorative techniques which reflect the artistic taste of the time.

Il Tesoro del Cremlino Silver Museum 27 May-11 September About 150 works represent the Kremlin Armoury, originally the place in charge of producing weapons and an arsenal that later became Russia’s richest collection of royal treasures and court objects.

From the 12th to the 18th century it was the ‘treasury’, filled with Byzantine, Russian, Persian, Turkish and European jewels, armour, embroideries and objects connected with the coronation ceremonies of the tsars. Jewels of the 12th and 13th century, enamelled icons, cameos and engraved gems from the Byzantine period, coming from the Cathedral, are exhibited next to 15th-century creations in filigree from the artistic laboratories of the Kremlin.

ulyjulyaugustaugustaugustaugustseptemberseptemberseptember

5

palazzo pitti photo Francesca Anichini

Mauro Linari Architect, Soprintendenza Speciale per il Patrimonio Storico, Artistico e Etnoantropologico e per il Polo Museale della città di Firenze

Greenhouses in Boboli Gardens

6

Botanica Superiore The area of Boboli with the greatest concentration of greenhouses is the Giardino della Botanica, next to the Palazzina della Vecchia, today occupied by the garden’s administrative offices and once the house of the Head Gardener. This rectangular area was designated as a vegetable garden at the time of the 17th-century enlargement of Boboli, and in 1766 was transformed, to designs by Niccolò Gaspero Paoletti and Giuseppe Ruggeri, into a Jardin Potager, that is, a garden intended for the cultivation of legumes and rare and unusual fruits. By 1789 the garden already had ten couches, greenhouses half-sunken into the ground where rare and exotic fruits were cultivated and protected in the early stages of their growth. Between 1815 and 1817 Giuseppe Cacialli designed two tepidariums, both of which are still in existence. In 1852 the Palermo botanist Filippo Parlatore, who ten years earlier Grand Duke Leopoldo II had appointed director of the Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale, took over the area of the Jardin Potager with the idea of creating a botanical garden to organize plants according to their geographical provenance. Of the structures that existed at the time of Parlatore, today there remain the two tepidariums designed by Cacialli, three greenhouses and three couches. Architecturally speaking, the Tepidario Grande is the most well defined, particularly in the central part where the entrance is framed by a double pair of Doric columns supporting a rectangular tympanum, thus conferring to the entire building a distinctly neo-classical feel. The front of the tepidarium, facing south, consists of a long row of large windows covering the entire height of the structure up to the upper cornice. The large windows, which have their original fittings, are slightly tilted so as to capture the heat of the sun’s rays. The tepidarium, whose façade is in need of conservational restoration, was used by Parlatore as a temperate glasshouse for plants coming from America. To the sides of the entrance, and running along the entire length of the tepidarium, were two couches, today flower-beds, whose original opening glass panels have survived. On the same side of the garden, next to the Palazzina della Vecchia, is the Tepidario Piccolo. This also has a long row of slightly inclined large windows and is accessed by means of a lateral staircase; the upper part ends in a high cornice with vaguely neo-Egyptian architectural details.

Parlatore kept tropical plants here. In 1881, after the Orto Botanico had been moved to the Giardino dei Semplici, the greenhouses were used for the cultivation of ornamental plants to be supplied to the Royal Household. In the rise between the Tepidario Piccolo and the level of the garden is a glasshouse that was reserved for the orchids that were grown here until 1966 and used for the decoration of the Sala Bianca in Palazzo Pitti during the fashion shows that were held there from 1953. In the high part of the garden is a very long couche, originally used for the multiplication of plants and today in a poor state of repair, despite the fact that it still has its original heating system, obviously now no longer working. In front of it is the Serra Fredda, used by Parlatore for plants coming from the Cape of Good Hope and still used today. This small building has a glass barrel vault, the result of recent renovation, while originally it had a glass roof with two sloping surfaces that was better suited to catching the heat of the sun’s rays. Immediately below is the Serra Calda, which housed the Medinilla plant that was imported from Asia in 1867.

palazzo pitti photo Francesca Anichini

Giardino della Sughera and Giardino della Lavacapo In the immediate vicinity of the Botanica Superiore, at the top of the Viale dei Cipressi on the left, is the Giardino della Sughera supported by two mighty vaults made in 1619 to bring it to the same level as the Giardino della Lavacapo which is located, in a matching position, on the opposite side of the Viale dei Cipressi. These two gardens formed part of a single unit and were used for the cultivation of espaliered citrus trees on the top surface of the fortified enclosure that Cosimo I had built in 1544. In the Giardino della Sughera is a low couche for the propagation of plants and two greenhouses, the one situated in the lower part used for the cultivation of arum lilies. At the end of the Giardino della Lavacapo was a large room for vases, called “Lo Stanzonaccio”, built against the 14th-century walls to designs by Giulio Parigi, used later as a deposit and today being renovated to house the Museo delle Sculture di Boboli.

Botanica Inferiore About halfway along the avenue joining the Piazzale della Meridiana to Annalena is a walled garden, created by Giuseppe Ruggeri and Niccolò Gaspero Paoletti between 1771 and 1778, which was used as the first botanical garden.

To the south of it, Giuseppe Cacialli designed two terraces on the slope leading down to the Annalena entrance and later, between 1815 and 1817, two tepidariums. The lower terrace still has the shape wanted by Cacialli, although the original beds no longer exist.

This area is called the Botanica Inferiore, the site of one of the two tepidariums; the other, on the same level as the upper terrace, has been incorporated into the Museo della Specola and converted into offices. The façade of the tepidarium has eleven large windows, one of which is used as an entrance. Today the tepidarium is used to house the large terracotta vases of citrus trees that are arranged on two walls of different height. Another low wall is situated internally next to the base supporting the windows and is used for the smaller plants that require more light. During the summer months the vases of citrus trees are set up on the terrace in front. Still present in this area, on the extrados of the Grotta di Adamo ed Eva below, is the so-called “Teatro dei Vasi”, formed by a circular flight of steps on which flowering plants are placed during the warmer months of the year.

Limonaia Just below the Botanica Inferiore, descending towards the Vasca dell’Isola, is the Limonaia Grande, used even today to house the 500 or so terracotta vases of citrus trees. It was built on the orders of Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo between 1777 and 1778, to designs by Zanobi del Rosso, on the site of the Serraglio degli Animali built by Cosimo III in 1677. The façade, whose many bays are divided by pilaster strips, consists of a regular repetition of four sections, each occupied by a row of four large windows surmounted by a corresponding number of smaller framed windows. The sections of the façade are divided by three portals crowned by scroll decorations and festoons with fruit, while the upper part of the façade ends in a moulded cornice; the flat surfaces between the pilaster strips are painted in the green of the Lorraine tradition. Inside, two long low walls of different heights allow the citrus plants to benefit from the sunlight without covering each other. In 1816 the left part of the lemon-house was extended by Giuseppe Cacialli with the construction of a room for the storage of materials and tools with an adjoining room for the Head Gardener. The area in front of the lemon-house is occupied by a garden with four large beds used essentially for the cultivation of roses. The garden is bounded by an iron fence built by Cacialli in 1822, consisting of rope-shaped horizontal members sustained by spires with pineapple finials. The fence is flanked by two pillars with smooth rustication, each surmounted by two classical statues of Muses.

7

opera di santa maria del fiore

stablished at the end of the 13th century to oversee the construction of Florence’s new cathedral, the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore today administers a group of monuments and buildings of exceptional importance, structures that developed around the Cathedral. The complex of buildings, apart from the Duomo and the Baptistery, consists of a variety of ‘places’ characterised by a striking individuality and a historical and functional specificity.

E

via della Canonica, 1 office hours: Monday to Friday 8-19, Saturday 8-14

www.operaduomo.firenze.it

Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore

Designed by the architect Arnolfo di Cambio, and the world’s third largest church, Santa Maria del Fiore was built on the earlier church of Santa Reparata and dedicated in 1412 to Santa Maria del Fiore, clearly alluding to the lily, a symbol of the city. The façade was completed only at the end of the 19th century. open: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 10-17; Thursday 10-16.30, May and October 10-16, from July to September 10-17; Saturday 10-16.45; Sunday and major holidays 13.30-16.45

The Cupola

The construction of the cupola, the largest dome ever built, began in1420; five years later construction was under Brunelleschi alone and was completed up to the base of the lantern on 1 August 1436.

Baptistery of San Giovanni

With an octagonal plan, entirely faced with white and green marble from Prato, the Baptistery we see today was built over a smaller and earlier Baptistery dating from the 4th or 5th century. open: every day 12.15-19, first Saturday of the month, Sundays and holidays 8.30-14

(archaeological site) A major excavation beneath the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, carried out between 1965 and 1973, brought to light the remains of the ancient basilica of Santa Reparata, the oldest evidence of early Christianity in Florence.

Giotto’s Campanile

open: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 10-17, Saturday 10-16.45, 1 May 8.30-17 closed: on the occasion of major holidays

Giotto’s bell tower, begun in 1334, is one of the four principal components of Piazza del Duomo. At a height of 84.70 metres and about 15 metres wide, it is the most eloquent example of 14th-century Florentine Gothic architecture. open: every day 9-19.30

open: every day 8.30-19, Saturday 8.30-17.40 closed: Sunday and major holidays

The remaining new rooms, not on this plan Sala del Coro bandinelliano On show are panels from the Bandinelli choir, two explanatory models, and placed in the floor an octagonal piece of marble from the Baptistery.

8

Crypt of Santa Reparata

Galleria della Cupola This room houses the wooden models of the cupola and lantern. Two large glassed-in niches contain a reconstruction of Brunelleschi’s workshop and other historical models.

Sala dell’Altare A space devoted to the precious San Giovanni needlework panel worked to a design by Pollaiolo.

Sala della Maddalena This room houses Donatello’s Maddalena, here shown with the large altarpiece of St. Zenobius.

Sala delle Cantorie and Sala Fondi Oro The most significant change to the room housing the cantorie of Donatello and Luca della Robbia is the insertion of a Bandinelli doorway that leads to the Sala Fondi Oro.

focus

Plan of the ground floor of the new Museum

The project for the new Museo dell’Opera

Sala della Pietà In this room, where light filters in from above, stands Michelangelo’s group sculpture, on a base in pietra serena. This base, itself on a hidden lifting apparatus, can lift the sculpture in case of flood.

Viewing point From here visitors have an exceptional view of Brunelleschi’s cupola, having understood the history of the workshops and studied the models shown in the room below.

piazza del Duomo, 9 open: Monday to Saturday 9-19.30, Sunday 9-13.40 closed: 1 January, Easter, 8 September, 25 December

A series of galleries facing the reconstruction of the façade make it possible to see into the room at different levels and points of view.

The Galleria del Campanile, on the first floor, shows the works for Giotto’s bell tower. The sculptures are on a base raised to about 120 cm, which means the viewer looks from below upwards. Opposite are panels of the bell tower.

The gallery on the second floor houses models and studies for the façade of the Duomo, up until the 19th-century competition. A large skylight reveals Brunelleschi’s cupola, outside the museum.

opera di santa maria del fiore

Estabilished in 1891, the museum conservs works of art removed from their outdoor location at Santa Maria del Fiore; it boasts an exceptional collection, with masterpieces by Michelangelo, Donatello, Lorenzo Ghiberti and Luca della Robbia. Large-scale building work will completely transform the museum: the architectural project and museum installation of Adolfo Natalini e Guicciardini & Magni Architetti is proposing to renovate part of the museum, redesign the former Teatro degli Intrepidi and create areas connecting the various parts of the buildings. The new exhibition area will consist of two structures, linked together in a single system: the historical structure, formerly the museum, and the new area of the Teatro degli Intrepidi, purchased in 1998. Double the amount of space will thus be made available, from 2,432 to 4,924 sq.m.: 2,427 sq.m. will be devoted to the exhibits and the remaining space given over to reception areas and technical facilities. Work is expected to end in 2016, given that the Opera has decided not to close the museum but to proceed in successive stages. The need for the maintenance and restoration of the works, and the great tradition and professionalism of the Opera, have prompted the setting up of a restoration laboratory in rooms on the ground floor.

Sala dell’Antica Facciata The one-time theatre, the Teatro degli Intrepidi, is dominated by the partial reconstruction of the old façade of Santa Maria del Fiore, made with a metal skeleton finished in a light wood. The evocative lifesize model is the fruit of rigorous research into drawings, architectural reliefs and stone fragments. The fifth gallery opposite the façade is designed to contain the three bronze doors of the Baptistery in special cases. On show are the ‘Gate of Paradise’ with works by Sansovino, Danti and Rustici.

Cutaway showing galleries and the ground floor.

Project by Adolfo Natalini and the Studio Guicciardini & Magni

9

the uffizi

focus Vasari, gli Uffizi e il Duca

curated by Claudia Conforti, Francesca de Luca and Antonio Godoli The Uffizi 14 June-30 October

10

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/uffizi

piazzale degli Uffizi open: Tuesday to Sunday 8.15-18.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December We advise visitors to make a reservation

On the fifth centennial of the birth of Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574), the theme of this exhibition is the foundation of the Uffizi (15591560): more than a building, the Uffizi is an architectural system on an urban scale, the result of close collaboration between Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici and Vasari, his favourite artist. Taking its cue from the personalities of the protagonists, the Duke and his artist, the exhibition firstly focuses on the urban layout between Palazzo Vecchio and the Arno before the construction of the Uffizi; it then illustrates the phases of the conception and construction of the complex, whose worksite was the largest and most demanding in 16th-century Florence. The show illustrates the monument’s spatial and figurative peculiarities, such as the outstanding wooden doors of the Magistracies; its formal and typological ancestry that harks back to the architecture of ancient Rome, wellknown to Vasari and the learned Humanists of his circle, such as Paolo Giovio and Vincenzo Borghini, and references the contemporary architecture of Venice and Rome, cities the artist had visited many times. The very well-organised worksite that military architect Bernardo Puccini directed with a firm hand is evoked by antique work tools, which are joined by artefacts walled in the vaults and only recently discovered. The Uffizi, though, is also the mature fruit of an exuberant artistic milieu monopolised by the court and in awe of the genius of Michelangelo, which attracted many protagonists and co-protagonists: from Pierfrancesco Riccio, the Duke’s house-steward, to Luca Martini, Cosimo Bartoli, and Benedetto Varchi, all of whom are evoked in the exhibition. Considering Vasari a provincial, this competitive circle kept him at a distance until the artist triumphantly entered the service of the Duke (1554). The exhibition illustrates these two moments of rejection and success through works by the artists who opposed Vasari and works by those who favoured him, revealing a dense artistic and cultural milieu that marked the peak of the full Renaissance in Florence, which was well represented by the legendary splendour of the wedding of Prince Francesco and Joanna of Austria (1565) when the Uffizi complex had not yet been completed.

calendar of exhibitions april-september 2011

Uffizi pages edited by Valentina Conticelli with Monica Alderotti

“La città degli Uffizi 5”

“La città degli Uffizi 6”

I Ghirlandaio. Una famiglia di pittori del Rinascimento tra Firenze e Scandicci

Giovanni Martinelli pittore di Montevarchi

curated by Annamaria Bernacchioni Scandicci, Castello dell’Acciaiolo until 1 May

curated by Bruno Santi and Andrea Baldinotti Montevarchi, Auditorium Comunale 19 March-12 June

The exhibition, promoted by the Comune di Scandicci for the series “La città degli Uffizi”, presents to the public the relationship linking Domenico Ghirlandaio and his brothers (David and Benedetto) and son Ridolfo, to a particular area of Florentine territory, today identifiable as the municipality of Scandicci. 16 works are exhibited, including some masterpieces from Florentine museums, together with those visible at the Badia di San Salvatore e Lorenzo at Settimo, focal point of the Ghirlandaio family’s artistic production, where Domenico and his workshop painted a number of panels, today still in situ, and the frescoes of the façade of the great chapel, unfortunately almost all of them completely lost. These paintings illustrate the family-based character of the artistic workshop of the Ghirlandaio family, frequented by numerous disciples and assistants, from which various masterpieces emerged.

The exhibition, promoted by the Comune di Montevarchi for the “La città degli Uffizi” series, is dedicated to Giovanni Martinelli, one of the most intriguing figures in Florentine painting of the 17th century, but also, outside of a limited circle of specialists, one of the least known. In keeping with the principle consistently pursued by the series, the Montevarchi exhibition also has at its centre a work housed in the deposits of the Florentine gallery, The Banquet of Baldassarre, considered by art critics a sort of sum total of the painter’s artistic world, emblematic in gathering within its vast and complex compositional scheme most of the themes and subjects around which Martinelli laboured in the course of his career.

aprilaprilaprilaprilmaymaymaymayjunejunejunejunejulyjulyju

the uffizi

Tapestries

The logic of numbers

In the pages of a daily newspaper I recently had occasion to play around with the number of visitors to the Uffizi. I did it not because I’ve ever considered numbers to be that important (those who know me know what really interests me at the Uffizi). I did it instead to induce readers to a reflection, reminding them that when, at the beginning of 2009 the Gallery registered a drop in attendance of 3.84%, the news was of course all over the papers.

Today, instead, when an increase of 7.89% has been recorded, no one bothers to make a point of it. When you think about it, those 120,737 more visitors to the Uffizi in 2010 compared to 2009 (there are important museums that don’t get 120,000 visitors in a whole year) are a lot of people. A total of 1,651,055 visitors entered the Uffizi in 2010. If a strike involving the personnel of the Florentine museums had not forced the Gallery to close during the weekend of the Immacolata (usually very crowded), and if during the weekend of 17-19 December snow had not blocked the roads linking Florence to the rest of Italy, the year 2010 would probably have established a new record in the number of visitors, surpassing the previous best of 1,663,438 registered in 2006. Neither should one fail to consider that in the intervening years the western economy has certainly not had an easy time of it. If on the one hand there are increasing concerns about the protection of works displayed in the Gallery (a museum ‘great’ in history, though ‘small’ in size), on the other – certainly as far as ‘numbers’ are concerned – there’s every reason to be happy about Florentine tourism. How nice it would be, however, if those who draw benefit from an increase in visitors sent some sign of appreciation capable of offsetting the dissatisfaction that surfaces every time a fall-off is registered. But no, it just doesn’t happen. Just as nothing, in my view, has been said or done to show a little gratitude to those who in low season organised the Bronzino exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi (organised from scratch, I must stress, not already curated), with the extremely positive response from the public that ensued. An exhibition which between October and January, with its 140,781 visitors, brought to Florence so many people from outside the city (both Italians and foreigners). I sincerely trust these words are not interpreted as just blame. May they be taken instead as an invitation to everyone to be participants in the city’s events, enjoying their successes, but also, in future, sharing from the outset both risks and responsibilities.

Antonio Natali

A necessary, if expensive, enterprise

In recent years various exhibitions have drawn attention to the collection of tapestries, which, due to their poor state of repair, are conserved in large numbers in deposits at Palazzo Pitti and at the Uffizi. Sometimes restoration, a demanding operation in terms of time and cost, improves their condition to the extent that they can be viewed and admired, as was the case with the splendid tapestries based on cartoons by Bronzino put on display during the recent exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi, or with the two Hunting scenes now on exhibition at Poggio a Caiano. However, in general the comparison between the vivid colours on the back of the tapestries – not subjected to the aggression of light – and the more faded ones on the front, invariably prompts considerations on the need to properly conserve these precious and delicate manufactures. An example of this is evident in the detail from a peripheral portion of the Battle of Cannae, one of the works from the cycle representing the Stories of Hannibal, conserved in the deposits of the Galleria degli Uffizi, woven in around 1560 by the Brussels tapestry-worker Cornelis de Ronde (according to Guy Delmarcel and Claire Dumortier, and supported by Lucia Meoni). The fading of the colours on the front of the tapestry, caused by too much exposure to the light, contrasts with the stronger and more vibrant green and red threads on the back of the cloth, which the present operation of maintenance and even future cleaning will in any case be unable to restore.

Giovanna Giusti Department of Tapestries

Director of the Uffizi

calendar of exhibitions april-september 2011 “La città degli Uffizi 7”

Santi, poeti, navigatori… curated by Francesca de Luca Montecatini, Terme Tamerici 16 April-16 July The exhibition promoted by the Friends of the Uffizi, the Comune di Montecatini and the Uffizi Gallery, is hosted in the Tamerici Building at the thermal baths of Montecatini. The exhibition focuses on the portraits of illustrious men that Paolo Giovio assembled in Como, and that Cosimo I ordered copies of, to hang them in Palazzo Vecchio. The selection of portraits is enriched by the presence of two paintings that belonged to Giovio and come from the Museo Civico of Como, and by the portrait of Amico Aspertini that belonged to the same collection and that the Gallery acquired in 2010, thanks to the generosity of the Friends of the Uffizi.

Benozzo Gozzoli e Cosimo Rosselli nelle terre di Castelfiorentino.

Pittura devozionale in Valdelsa curated by Serena Nocentini and Anna Padoa Rizzo Castelfiorentino, Be.Go. Museo Benozzo Gozzoli 30 April-31 July Part of the ‘La città degli Uffizi’ series, the exhibition focuses on the painters active in Castelfiorentino and in the Valdelsa in the second half of the 15th century, devoting particular attention to Benozzo Gozzoli and Cosimo Rosselli, and showcasing prestigious paintings that present stylistic and historical ties with the frescoes of Benozzo Gozzoli housed at the Be.Go., the new museum dedicated to the artist in Castelfiorentino.

Alongside the panel painting by Beato Angelico from the Vatican Museums, and works by Cosimo Rosselli and Benozzo Gozzoli from Assisi, Vicchio and Città di Castello, visitors will also be able to admire art treasures from other parts of the region which, though less known, are of great interest. The exhibition is flanked by numerous initiatives in the intent to showcase the artistic and landscape patrimony of the Valdelsa.

ulyjulyaugustaugustaugustaugustseptemberseptemberseptember

11

the uffizi

presentation of the Japanese self-portraits

On 21 March three self-portraits are presented by Japanese artists, who have donated their works to the Galleria degli Uffizi to coincide with the exhibition Self-Portraits from the Uffizi Gallery, held in Tokyo and Osaka between September 2010 and February 2011. The three artists – Yayoi Kusama, Tanadori Yokoo and Hiroshi Sugimoto – internationally acclaimed as being among the most representative of Japanese artistic expression in the latter half of the 20th century, have produced either with painting or with photography, specially for the new Collection of the Uffizi, works of storage-rooms particular expressive Work has been completed originality. on the storage-rooms of the Gallery of the Nuovi Uffizi. presentation of The new spaces will house, the restored on a grilled stacking system, Massacre of the Innocents a few thousand works in the

by Marco Benefial Gallery’s repositories.

Spring will see the presentation to the public of the restored Massacre of the Innocents by Marco Benefial, one of the principal and most controversial figures on the eighteenth-century Roman art scene.

Following a difficult and laborious intervention that has permitted the recovery of a very important work of art, the monumental and dramatic painting from the Feroni Collection will be placed in the Gallery.

“a most excellent painter who day and night does nothing but paint plants and animals of all kinds […] all they lack is life” Ulisse Aldrovandi

opening of the Sale degli Stranieri

Due to delays on the construction site, the first ten rooms of the Nuovi Uffizi open to the public in the early summer. The rooms dedicated to sixteenthand seventeenth-century painting by Foreign Schools, are located on the first floor of the Gallery, and look onto the courtyard of the Reali Poste and the chiasso dei Baroncelli, near the Contini Bonacossi Collection. The entrance is via the stairs at the far end of the Third Corridor, which are being reopened along with fully renovated bathrooms. The Sale degli Stranieri will host Dutch, Flemish, French and Spanish paintings, enabling visitors to admire not only masterpieces by Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Dyck, Chardin, Liotard and Goya, but also many other important works of art (about one hundred paintings in all), only a very few of which have been exhibited. These new rooms of the Museum will illustrate the collecting interests deeply rooted in the Medici family for Flemish and Dutch painting, as well as the decision of Ferdinand III of Lorraine to increase the pictorial schools represented in the Gallery in the late 18th century, with a significant opening purchase of French paintings in times 1792.

Vasari Corridor For information on opening times and on how to book an appointment consult the website www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/vasariano

Collezione Contini Bonacossi Free visits.

For information on opening times and on how to book an appointment consult the website www.polomuseale.firenze.it/ musei/continibonacossi

information from the museum Preparations for the next exhibition Work is underway on the first floor of the Gallery setting up the exhibition Vasari, gli Uffizi e il Duca which opens on 14 June: the Uffizi apologises for any inconvenience to visitors. It is still possible to visit the rooms containing the work of Caravaggio and his followers.

new publications • Giotto. Il Polittico di Badia restaurato, edited by A. Tartuferi, Edizioni Mandragora, forthcoming

12

• Bollettino degli Uffizi 2009, edited by F. Chezzi, M. Marini, Firenze, Centro Di, 2010

exhibition abroad: China

From the Collections of The Uffizi Gallery The Genres of Painting: Landscape, Still Life and Portrait Paintings curated by Antonio Natali Beijing (12 March-17 May) Shenyang (15 June-28 August) In collaboration with Contemporanea Progetti and the China Italy Museum League, the Uffizi Gallery put together an exhibition that was held in five different venues in China, presenting a selection of paintings from the 15th to the 20th century from the deposits of the Florentine museum and the Vasari Corridor. Taking its cue from past editions of the “Mai visti” shows dedicated to landscape and still-life painting, the Chinese exhibition is enriched with a section dedicated to portraits and selfportraits. The main theme of this extensive selection of works that first showed in Beijing, was the painting genres dear to the Medici and collected by important members of the family, including Cosimo II, Cardinal Leopoldo, Cosimo III and Grand Prince Ferdinando.

was born in Verona and was active in Florence from 1577 until 1626, the year of his death. A versatile painter, he was known above all for his work in the sphere of scientific illustration at the service of the Medicean court. In particular Francesco I and Ferdinando I entrusted him with the reproduction of rare or exotic species that arrived at the court, often through the despatches and requests of the Bolognese naturalist Ulisse Aldrovandi (1522-1605), a great admirer of Ligozzi. The remarkable faithfulness of his illustrations, many of which are now kept in the Uffizi Department of Prints and Drawings, was guaranteed by the proximity of his house to the Giardino dei Semplici, which allowed the painter direct observation of its plants and flowers.

the uffizi department of prints and drawings (gabinetto disegni e stampe)

Jacopo Ligozzi,

he prestigious collection of drawings and prints of the GDSU began with the Medici family collections and in particular with the works assembled by Leopoldo de’ Medici, who became cardinal in 1667.

Leopoldo made use of numerous agents to purchase folios by the greatest Renaissance and Mannerist artists. The Lorraine, who came to the throne of Tuscany in 1737 following the extinction of the Medici dynasty, enriched the collection, which was added to in the period following the constitution of the Kingdom of Italy thanks to a great many donations. Today, the collection contains over 150,000 works by Tuscan artists, artists of other Italian schools, and Flemish and Dutch, French, Spanish, and German artists.

T

via della Ninna, 5 Opening hours follow those of the Uffizi Access to the Sala di Studio is reserved to scholars, upon letter of presentation. open: Monday, Wednesday, Friday 8.30-13.30, Tuesday and Thursday 8.30-17

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/disegni

exhibition

Figure, memorie, spazio.

Disegni da Fra’ Angelico a Leonardo curated by Marzia Faietti, Alessandra Griffo and Giorgio Marini at the Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi and at the Reali Poste 8 March-12 June 100 drawings from the Uffizi Department of Prints and Drawings and from the British Museum, two of the most important collections of drawings in the world. This show, already exhibited at the London museum, is a unique opportunity to compare masterpieces representing mostly Florentine and central Italian circles, with artists of the highest calibre – Lorenzo Monaco, Beato Angelico, Filippo and Filippino Lippi, the Pollaiolo brothers, Verrocchio, Botticelli, Perugino, Ghirlandaio, Leonardo, Raphael and Michelangelo – while space is also dedicated to northern Italy with Pisanello, Amico Aspertini, the Ferrarese artists, Jacopo and Gentile Bellini, Mantegna and Titian. The Florence exhibition significantly contributes to the study of drawing, a medium that became established in the 15th century as an independent artistic expression, with a further selection of about 60 works that could not have been moved and presented at the previous London exhibition. The additional exhibition, set up at the Reali Poste, is organised into three themes – figures, memories, space – and includes prestigious works like Mantegna’s Judith from the Book of Drawings by Vasari and the sketch for the Monument to John Hawkwood by Paolo Uccello.

conference Aesthetics and Techniques of Lines between Drawing and Writing 30 June-2 July international conference organised by Gerhard Wolf (KHI) and Marzia Faietti (GDSU) at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz www.khi.fi.it

13

Herbariums not only represent an important branch of medieval encyclopedic knowledge, they are also splendid albums of illustrations in their own right.

Knowledge of the properties of plants is transmitted together with representations that in the course of time became increasingly realistic to the point of acquiring authentic scientific validity.

Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana (Laurentian Library) opened to the public: 1571 by order of Grand Duke Cosimo I origin: a collection begun by Cosimo il Vecchio collection: approx. 11,000 manuscripts, 2,500 papyri, 150 drawers of single leaves, 43 ostraka, 566 incunabula, 1,681 cinquecentine, 592 periodicals and 126,527 printed books piazza San Lorenzo, 9 open: Monday, Wednesday, Friday 8-14, Tuesday, Thursday 8-17.30

www.bml.firenze.sbn.it

Herbaria of the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana

libraries

The manuscript collections of the Laurentian Library include texts by various authors: from the earliest scholars of the plant world – like the physician Theophrastus (ca. 372-287 BC), who described over 500 plants and their medicinal use in his Historia plantarum (Plutei 85.3, 85.22); Pliny the Elder (1st century AD), who dedicated many of the 37 books of his encyclopedia Naturalis Historia to botany and to the medicinal properties of plants (Plutei 82.1-82.4); and Dioscorides, a military physician of the 1st century AD, who described about 600 plants, herbs and roots and their therapeutic virtues in his De materia medica, the most widespread source of botanical knowledge throughout the Middle Ages up to the dawn of the modern age – up to the treatises of botanical pharmacopeia produced or translated from Arabic in the sphere of the Scuola Medica Salernitana and the Italian language translations of the Humanistic age. In particular, among the Latin manuscripts of Dioscorides, which often handed down other analogous texts, imbued with magical elements and medico-alchemical concepts, like the Herbarium of Pseudo-Apuleius (5th century AD), the Library houses the Pluteo 73.41 (9th century), from southern Italy, which in the second half of the 15th century belonged to the Veronese physician Gabriele Zerbi, and Pluteo 73.16, recently believed to be of the Swabian period (13th century), and attributed with Campanian provenance due to representations concerning the therapeutic uses of medicinal herbs and the authors themselves. Also worth mentioning are the herbaria conserved in the 15thcentury manuscripts Ashb. 456 (in Italian) and 731 (in Latin), and in Redi 165 – coming from the collection of the Aretine Francesco Redi and containing a text attributed to Maestro Ghino da Firenze – which on each sheet have drawings of plants accompanied by human and animal figures.

Lastly, in this partial list, one cannot but mention one of the Library’s real treasures, the celebrated Historia general de las cosas de Nueva España (Med. Pal. 218-220), a work consisting of 12 books in Spanish and in Nahuatl, written by the Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún (1499-1590), an essential source for the history, uses and customs of Mexican civilization before and at the time of the conquest of Hernán Cortés (1519-1521). Book XI is dedicated to natural history, and in particular to plants.

Eugenia Antonucci Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana

Biblioteca Marucelliana opened to the public: 1752 founder: Francesco Marucelli (1625-1703) collection: the core of the collection, which grew as a result of successive acquisition, consists of about 6,000 volumes; since 1911 the library has been the repository for all books published in Florence and its province via Cavour, 43-47 open: Monday to Friday 8.30-19, Saturday 8.30-13.45

www.maru.firenze.sbn.it

Biblioteca delle Oblate opened to the public: 2007, following the restoration of the complex origin: the Biblioteca Comunale Centrale (1913) collection: the section on conservation and local history alone consists of over 50,000 documents via dell’Oriuolo, 26 open: Monday 14-19, Tuesday to Saturday 9-24 (times subject to change)

www.bibliotecadelleoblate.it

exhibition

Voci dall’oriente. Miniature e testi classici da Bisanzio alla Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana 4 March-30 June

14

The Medici family, and particularly Lorenzo il Magnifico, were the patrons who did most to safeguard the literary heritage of ancient Greece, through purchases they made and gifts they received, which arrived in Florence especially in the 15th century. The exhibition presents 42 manuscripts of the Greek classics and a rich group of Byzantine miniatures. On display are an anthology of texts by Greek authors which Byzantine Humanists saved between the 9th and 15th century, illuminated manuscripts from the Byzantine period (9th-14th century), almost all of the Old and the New Testaments, and lastly Renaissance editions of Greek texts produced by Florentine Humanists and their patrons. open: Monday to Saturday 9.30-13.30 closed: holidays and 1st Saturday of the month

Biblioteca degli Uffizi opened to the public: 1998 in the restored rooms of the ex Biblioteca Magliabechiana origin: the first public library in Florence, founded by Pietro Leopoldo of Lorraine in the mid-18th century collection: 74,000 titles, including 470 manuscripts, 5 incunabula, 192 cinquecentine, 1,445 books from the 17th to the 19th century, 1,136 periodicals Loggiato degli Uffizi open: Tuesday 9-17, Wednesday 9-13.30, Friday 9-13

www.polomuseale.firenze.it

libraries

Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale opened to the public: 1861, with the unification of the Magliabechiana and Palatina libraries origin: Antonio Magliabechi (Magliabechiana) and Ferdinando III (Palatina) collection: 6,000,000 printed books, 120,000 periodicals, 4,000 incunabula, 25,000 manuscripts, 29,000 cinquecentine and more than 1,000,000 autographs piazza dei Cavalleggeri, 1 open: Monday to Friday 8.15-19, Saturday 8.15-13.30

www.bncf.firenze.sbn.it

Herbaria in the deposits of the Biblioteca Nazionale

The library contains a rich collection of manuscripts and rare printed volumes, sometimes accompanied by precious illustrations, which documents the evolution of botanical studies up until the birth of modern science. A brief exploration of some of the documents reveals the complex stratification of the numerous deposits that have contributed to forming the patrimony of the Institute. The Fondo Palatino, particularly rich in botanical works thanks also to the acquisitions of Ferdinando III of Habsburg-Lorraine and in line with the Florentine tradition of scientific research, conserves, among others, a Herbarium of Provençal origin (Pal. 586, 14th century); a parchment manuscript (Pal. D.10.4.9 striscia 1418) with illustrations of various types of gall and related insects, reproduced both life-size and as if enlarged under a microscope (an instrument already in use at the Medici court), made in about 1667 by the painter Filizio Pizzichi and used to illustrate the Esperienze intorno alla generazione degli insetti

by Francesco Redi; the paper codex Hortus Regius Honselaerdicensis (Pal. 6.B.B.8.5) made by the painter Stefano Cousyns between 1685 and 1688, reproducing local and exotic flowers cultivated by the botanist Gaspar Fagel; the Hortus semper virens by Johann Simon Kerner (Pal. 6.B.1.1.1), printed in Stuttgart from 1791; the Icones (Pal. 8.5.6.19), a 32-volume collection of 968 tables with watercolours of plants and flowers from the garden of the Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale created between 1817 and 1842 by the botanist and illustrator Antonio Piccioli, author also of the Antotrofia, that is, the cultivation of flowers (Pal. 13.8.4.B), published in 1834. If the Fondo Palatino is the fruit of grand-ducal collectionism, that of the Targioni Tozzetti family is a reflection of the scientific interests of its members, as is revealed by the agricultural treatises of Agostino del Riccio, a Dominican friar of Santa Maria Novella, which also provide information on the introduction and cultivation of plants in Tuscany (ms. 56, end of 16th century). And lastly, as evidence of the interest in botany of the religious orders, we should mention the manuscripts of the Fondo Conventi Soppressi: that of the Abbazia di Vallombrosa, with illustrations of flowers and fruit (B.6.1085.III, 17th-18th century), and that of the convent of Santissima Annunziata, dated 1740, with Erbe dipinte al naturale colle loro denominazioni by Tommaso Chellini (G.5.1377).

Francesca Tropea

Biblioteca Riccardiana opened to the public: after 1659 origin: the collection of Riccardo Romolo Riccardi made in the 17th century collection: 4,450 manuscripts, 5,529 single leaves, 725 incunabula, 3,865 cinquecentine, 20,000 antique printed books, 40,000 modern printed books, 276 drawings via Ginori, 10 open: Monday, Thursday 8-17.30, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 8-14

www.riccardiana.firenze.sbn.it

Some of the botanical works in the Biblioteca Riccardiana • Erbario figurato, second half of the 15th century, Florentine manuscript • Tommaso Chelini, Nuovo libro de’ funghi fatto da Tommaso Maria Chelini cittadino fiorentino, Firenze 1703 (manuscript) • Leonhart Fuchs, De historia stirpium commentarii insignes, maximis impensis et vigiliis elaborati, adiectis earundem vivis plusquam quingentis imaginibus, numquam antea ad naturae imitationem artificiosius effictis, Basileae 1562

Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze

exhibitions 30 March-30 April Exhibition on Pellegrino Artusi organised by the Accademia della Crusca, the Comune di Firenze and the Comune di Forlimpopoli

7-10 May Antique maps on show during the Festival of Europe (European University Institute)

July-September Exhibition on the Camaldolesi in collaboration with the Biblioteca Rilliana of Poppi

The largest number of botanical writings in circulation since antiquity reflects the considerable attention that human beings have always devoted to the plant world.

Herbaria are some of the oldest texts, their success and popularity deriving from the knowledge they contain and their illustrative content.

Their history is inextricably intertwined with that of medicine and the pharmaceutical art, since from the earliest times herbs and plants have been observed and studied for their curative properties.

15

the accademia

n 1873 Michelangelo’s David was transferred to the specially designed tribune from Piazza della Signoria. The presence of the David, the Prisoners and St. Matthew indicate that in the 19th century the Gallery was already identifying itself as a Michelangelo museum. Yet the Gallery’s main collection is built upon the 18th-century collections of the Academy of Design and the Academy of Fine Arts, enriched with work from the suppressed information monasteries. The works collected here, in addition to the plaster casts, were used as teaching materials for the students from the museum the first floor of the Accademia. The holdings comprise mostly paintings by is closed until major artists who worked in and around Florence between the 3 April mid-13th and the late-16th century. The collection is especially important for its unique paintings on a gold background, the splendid late-Gothic polyptychs and the collection of Russian icons.

I

Department of Musical Instruments

Also displayed in the Accademia are about 50 musical instruments (17th to 19th century) from the private collections of the grand dukes of Tuscany, both Medici and Lorraine, shown against the splendid backdrop of various paintings representing scenes of the musical life of the Medicean court, panoplies and still lifes with musical instruments.

Among them are some remarkable instruments, both for their sound (audible on headphones at the terminals giving information on the musical culture of Florence under the grand dukes) as well as their exquisite workmanship. Among the most precious pieces are the ’cello and tenor viol by Stradivarius (1690), the only surviving pieces of the Quintetto mediceo that belonged to Grand Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici. via Ricasoli, 58-60 open: Tuesday to Sunday 8.15-18.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

exhibition

Lorenzo Bartolini.

Scultore del bello naturale 31 May-6 November First monographic exhibition dedicated to Lorenzo Bartolini (1770-1850), whose work had a crucial role in the development of sculpture in the 19th century. With numerous new additions to the catalogue, the artist’s stylistic evolution is illustrated by about 70 works, brought together for the first time to enrich the nucleus of models from the Gallery’s gipsoteca. For the first time since the 19th century important sculptures like the Napoleon I of the Louvre, the Faith in God of the Museo Poldi Pezzoli and others from Rennes, Saint Petersburg and Geneva, are on view in Florence. The exhibition offers up a vivid portrait of that cultured and refined international class of artists who produced the most important sculptures, portraits and commissions of decorative art, and also celebrates Bartolini’s longstanding friendship with Ingres with some significant canvases by the French artist.

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/accademia

Flowers of the Accademia.

Painted flowers, flowers in the garden The Accademia offers the opportunity to enjoy a pleasant pause during visits to Michelangelo’s David, with a short tour among the flowers decorating one of its courtyards. Here, one can admire the same species of flowers that are represented with such precision in the paintings of the 16th-century artists Alessandro Allori (Annunciation, Coronation of the Virgin, Madonna and Saints) and Giuliano Bugiardini (Madonna della Palma), displayed respectively in the left wing and right wing of the Tribune of the David. Through a viewing of the living species, and with the support of explanatory material, visitors can deepen their appreciation of the paintings, understanding both the general meaning of the flower depicted and its specific symbolic significance within the work in question. It is clear, therefore, that at times the presence of a flower in a given context is not merely and exclusively a choice of an aesthetic character made by the artist or by the person who commissioned the painting, but a way of underlining, enriching and reinforcing the message of the episode represented.

Orniello, silver vase, designed by Mario Zanini, 2001

shop via Porta Rossa, 99r Firenze

www.pampaloni.com

he Bargello National Museum is found in the former Palazzo del Capitano del Popolo, built in 1255 and in 1287 embellished with a verone, the loggia that opens onto the courtyard where the Podestà assembled the representatives of the guilds. In 1502, the palace became the seat of the Consiglio di Giustizia, headed by the Bargello or chief of police, and was then used as a prison. In 1865 the Bargello was transformed into a museum of sculpture and examples of the “minor arts”. Some of the greatest sculptures of the Renaissance have found their home here: masterpieces by Donatello, Verrocchio, Michelangelo, Cellini and Giambologna. Prestigious collections of small bronzes, majolica-ware, wax pieces, enamel work, medals, ivories, seals, and fabrics, from both the Medici collections and private donations, have enriched the museum’s holdings.

the bargello

T

via del Proconsolo, 4 open: Monday to Sunday 8.15-13.50 closed: 1st, 3rd, 5th Sunday, 2nd and 4th Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/bargello

L’acqua, la pietra, il fuoco Bartolomeo Ammannati scultore

exhibition summer at the Bargello

11 May-18 September First monographic exhibition dedicated to Bartolomeo Ammannati, on the 5th centenary of his birth. The title refers to the central theme of the exhibition, the three fountains the artist made for Duke Cosimo I. The exhibition provides the occasion for a spectacular reconstruction of the marble fountain composed of six statues of divinities intended for the Salone dei Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio, which was moved to Pratolino and to Boboli, before being transferred in separate parts to the Bargello. The project for the first fountain was interrupted in 1560 in favour of a public, and therefore more propagandistic, fountain in Piazza della Signoria; a few years later the Duke commissioned from the artist the enormous bronze statue of Hercules and Antaeus for the fountain of the garden of Castello. The exhibition is completed by drawings, plans, documents and other sculptures by Ammannati, as well as a documentary on the phases of execution of the copy of the statue of Juno. The copy of the statue is set up in the courtyard of the Bargello in its original position at the top of the fountain intended for the Salone dei Cinquecento. works on loan The Bargello is loaning work to the following museums: Berlin, Bode Museum, 25 August-20 November for the exhibition: Gesichter der Renaissance Brescia, Museo di Santa Giulia, until 12 June for the exhibition: Ercole il fondatore Caraglio (Cuneo), Museo del Filatoio, until 5 June for the exhibition: Animalia. Animali reali e fantastici nell’arte europea dal XV al XX secolo Florence, Palazzo Pitti, Palatine Gallery, 11 April-10 July for the exhibition: La Bella di Tiziano restaurata

May-August The museum hosts shows and concerts with international artists

theatre La Morsa by Pirandello (Compagnia Lombardi Tiezzi); Satyricon (Compagnia Verdastro della Monica); Romeo and Juliet (Compagnia F.E.S.T.A., in English); La beffa del grasso legnaiuolo (Scuola Nazionale Comici “Massimo Troisi” with Carlo Monni)

dance Made in Italy, 22° Florence Dance Festival

music Orchestra da Camera Fiorentina, Orchestra dei solisti dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Orchestra sinfonica di Grosseto; Nazzareno Carusi on the piano e Vittorio Sgarbi in Dante e Michelangelo, l’arte Italiana

Florence, San Marco Museum, 22 March-12 June for the exhibition: Il Tabernacolo dei Linaioli dell’Angelico restaurato

Moscow, Kremlin Museum, 25 May-24 July for the exhibition: Tesori medicei al Museo del Cremlino

Florence, the Uffizi, 14 June-30 October for the exhibition: Vasari, gli Uffizi e il Duca

Naumburg, Naumburg Saale, 29 June-2 November for the exhibition: Maestro di Naumburg. Scultore e architetto nell’Europa delle cattedrali

Lyon, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 31 March-20 September for the exhibition: Le genie de l’Orient. Lyon et les arts de l’Islam Mannheim-Palermo, ReissEnghelhorn Museum-Museo Archeologico Salinas, until 20 April for the exhibition: Gli Svevi e l’Italia Milan, Palazzo Reale, until 25 May for the exhibition: Arcimboldo. Artista milanese tra Leonardo e Caravaggio

Valencia, Centre del Carme, 1 April-31 July for the exhibition: El Nacimiento de la sederia valenciana siglos XV y XVI. El art dels velluters Venaria Reale (Turin), Reggia di Venaria Reale, 17 March-11 September for the exhibition: La Bella Italia.

Arte e identità delle città capitali

Padua, Musei Civici degli Eremitani, 16 April-31 July for the exhibition: Guariento e la Padova carrarese

restoration

Paris, Hôtel de Cluny, Musée National du Moyen Âge, 27 April-26 September for the exhibition: L’Epée-La spada

• Benedetto da Maiano, Due musici from the sculptural group Incoronazione di Carlomagno (from the Monumento di Ferdinando d’Aragona) • Madonna col Bambino, plaster relief, Florentine, second half of the 15th century

Fabbrica Pampaloni is open to the public

by appointment via del Gelsomino, 99 Firenze tel. 055 289094 www.pampaloni.com

opificio delle pietre dure and the restoration laboratories 18

s might be gathered from its unusual name, the origin of the Institute is composite, fruit of an ancient and illustrious tradition and modern, wide-ranging activity. Founded in 1588 for the manufacture of furnishings using semiprecious stones, in the late 19th century the Opificio changed character, shifting toward restoration. Following the catastrophic flood of November 1966 and the establishment of the Ministry for Cultural and Environmental Assets in 1975, the old Medici Opificio and the Restoration Laboratory of the Fine Arts Service were merged to create a single entity. In 2007, the Opificio became an Istituto Centrale and specialises in restoration, applied research and education, subdivided into specific sections including: tapestries, bronzes and antique weapons, paintings on canvas and on panel, wall paintings, works on paper and fibre, stone materials, mosaic and Florentine commesso work, goldsmiths’ and silversmiths’ work, painted wooden sculptures, ceramics and models, and textiles. The adjacent Museum mirrors the history of the centuries of activity carried out here, activity that included prestigious creations today preserved in palaces and museums throughout Europe. The collection contains pieces of great evocative power and sophistication, outlining the history of the workshop over three centuries, as well as an important collection of antique marbles and works in semiprecious stone exemplifying the commesso fiorentino inlay technique.

A

activities open to the public “effetto restauro” This initiative is designed to show the public some of the most significant works after their restoration or in the course of restoration in the Opificio laboratories. visits to the Restoration Laboratories Guided tours of the Restoration Laboratories in via degli Alfani, the Fortezza da Basso and the workshop for the restoration of the tapestries in Palazzo Vecchio.

For information and reservation

opd.promozioneculturale@beniculturali.it new publications Initiated in 1986, ‘OPD Restauro’ is an annual publication containing the most significant findings following restoration in all fields.

• The second series is now at its 22nd volume (1, 1989-22, 2010) with the title ‘OPD Restauro’ published by Centro Di.

exhibition

Opificio via degli Alfani, 78; Fortezza da Basso, viale Strozzi, 1; Palazzo Vecchio, Sala delle Bandiere

Museum via degli Alfani, 78; open: Monday to Saturday 8.15-14, from June to November (excluding August) Thursday 8.15-19 closed: Sunday and holidays For information: 055 2651357

www.opificiodellepietredure.it

Dagli splendori di corte al lusso borghese.

L’Opificio delle Pietre Dure nell’Italia unita 17 May-11 September Palazzo Pitti Gallery of Modern Art See p. 5

opificio delle pietre dure and the restoration laboratories

A Garden in Stone

Clarice Innocenti

Museum of the Opificio delle Pietre Dure

The production of the Opificio delle Pietre Dure (the name given to the old grandducal manufactory in the 19th century) certainly did not lack variety of subjects, which depended on the taste and requests of the different epochs of its activity: flowers, birds, fruit, landscapes, biblical stories, allegorical subjects, views of classical architecture. While all other themes were adopted and then abandoned when tastes changed, indeed appearing and disappearing in the span of only a few decades, the floral subject was a constant throughout the Opificio’s production history, with a stylistic evolution often tied to the trends of contemporary painting. In the intent to trace back the development of the floral theme and its technique of realisation through a few examples, the early Medici production is exemplified in a pair of quite large panels (formerly part of a large series, now dispersed), dated early-17th century: the geometric framing with a Roman flavour flanks the floral decoration with still schematic and rigorously symmetrical portions, while others are already permeated with a naturalistic sensitivity, such as in the apical lily, where the transparency of oriental chalcedony is exploited to render visible the colours applied on the back. Extraordinarily lofty results can be noted in the panel with a sunflower, intended for a cabinet that was never made, whose slate support bears the name Gerolamo della Valle and the date 1664. The use of coloured marble (the museum holds the pendant piece in semiprecious stones) provokes fascinating transparencies, and gives softness and realism to the otherwise schematic depiction of the flower. This sunflower already presents a refined virtuosity that was on the rise. As of the last decades of the 17th century, the search for an acute and elegant naturalism becomes established, reaching a peak of extraordinary refinement in the two console tops depicting the Allegories of Water and Air: the two splendid creations in semiprecious stone are found respectively at the Louvre and at the Hofburg in Vienna, while the Museo dell’Opificio retains the two preparatory canvases of the highest quality. In the Allegory of Air, dated 1765, the interweaving of the flowers and the flight of butterflies has a lightness and grace that finds affinities with the most suggestive results of contemporary European painting. A century later, the floral subject gained further ground with works in which the challenge with painting was stronger and more fascinating. An example of this moment is the table with the garland of roses and tondos with shells, designed

by Giovan Battista Giorgi in 1860: the fullness of the corollas, the challenge with realism typical of painting, the perfect execution and suggestive Egyptian nephrite ground make this one of the highest results attained in workmanship. In the last quarter of the century, following the Unification of Italy, and with the Opificio in a by now irreversible financial crisis (indeed ending production precisely in those years), the production was still of the highest quality and attuned to the first signs of the art nouveau that was gaining ground throughout Europe. This trend is clearly visible in the table with magnolias, and in a decorative wall panel with roses and bamboo: losing none of its power to evoke reality, the development of compositions, the shapes that become more pointed and develop obliquely, by now speak a new language. These were the years of Giuseppe Marchionni who directed the Opificio for fifty years, guiding it in its new activity, that of restoration.

19

oratories • cenacoli and fresco cycles

The Last Supper appeared in the decoration of convent refectories due to the parallel association of the subject presented to the monastic community as it gathered together to eat meals. Initially the scene was flanked by other episodes from the Life and Passion of Christ and only in the second half of the 15th century did scenes of the Last Supper start to be represented independently, often extending across an entire wall.

Following the suppression of the monastic orders in the 19th century, the refectories with their Last Suppers lost their connotation as secluded or restricted areas and in time many have been opened to the public for their considerable artistic value.

5.

4. Chiostro dello Scalzo

Cenacolo di Fuligno Last Supper attributed to Pietro Perugino and his workshop (1490)

episodes in the Vita del Battista and Virtù frescoed by Andrea del Sarto (1509-1526) and by Franciabigio (1518-1519)

1.

Oratorio dei Buonomini di San Martino

via Faenza, 42 open: Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday 9-12 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

Last Supper

by Domenico Ghirlandaio (1480) and its sinopia

6.

Church and Convent of Ognissanti borgo Ognissanti, 42 open: Monday, Tuesday and Saturday, 9-12 closed: 1 January, 1 May, August, 25 December

9.

via XXVII Aprile, 1 open: every day 8.15-13.50 closed: 1st, 3rd and 5th Sunday, 2nd and 4th Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

Crucifixion

by Perugino

2.

9

Crucifixion and Saints by Pietro Perugino (1493-1496) in the Sala Capitolare of the ex convent

1.

3

Church and Convent of Santa Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi access via the Liceo Michelangiolo in via della Colonna, 9 open: Tuesday and Thursday 14.30-17.30 closed: public holidays and school holidays

Cenacolo del Carmine Last Supper by Alessandro Allori (1582); Cappella Brancacci frescoed by Masaccio and Masolino and completed by Filippino Lippi

2

8.

Convento della Calza piazza della Calza, 6 open: upon request 055 222287 2

Cenacolo di Santo Spirito 3

fragments of the Ultima Cena

by Andrea Orcagna (c.1370); Crucifixion

3.

Oratorio di San Sebastiano dei Bini to see: the 16th-century polyptich commissioned by the Bini family for the high altar, the Tabernacle of Saint Sebastian in which Filippino Lippi played a part, and other work from the Ghiberti and Donatello workshops.

lungarno Diaz, 8 open: Monday to Friday 7-10, 16-18

Oratorio della Confraternita dei Contemplanti di San Tommaso d’Aquino (known as San Tommasino dei Nobili)

8

Last Supper by Franciabigio (1514) in the ex Convent of San Giovanni Battista known as the Calza.

to see: the revered Madonna delle Grazie attributed to the Maestro della Santa Cecilia (c.1313); frescoes

by Olinto Bandinelli and paintings

by Giuseppe Ciseri

And more...

1

2.

Oratorio di Santa Maria delle Grazie

1

Church and Convent of Santa Maria del Carmine piazza del Carmine open: Monday and Wednesday to Saturday 10-17, Sunday 13-17 closed: 1 and 7 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

Cenacolo della Calza

7

Last Supper by Andrea del Castagno (c.1450)

6

5

Museo del Cenacolo di Andrea del Sarto via di San Salvi, 16 open: Tuesday to Sunday 8.15-13.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

Cenacolo di Sant’Apollonia

4

via dei Magazzini open: every day 10-12, 15-17 closed: Friday and holidays

3.

Last Supper by Andrea del Sarto (1526-1527)

via Cavour, 69 open: Monday, Thursday, Saturday 8.15-13.50 closed: 1 January, 1 May, August, 25 December

to see: series of lunettes, painted by Domenico Ghirlandaio’s workshop (c.1480), illustrating the story of San Martino and the confraternity’s charitable . work.

Cenacolo di Ognissanti

7.

Cenacolo di San Salvi

Museo della Fondazione Salvatore Romano piazza Santo Spirito, 29 open: Saturday April to October 9-17, November to March 10.30-13.30 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

via Romana, 10 open: Friday to Sunday 16-19

via della Pergola, 10

Oratorio della Confraternita di San Francesco Poverino and Buca di San Girolamo in San Filippo Benizzi Loggiato dei Serviti, on the corner with palazzo Budini Gattai

Oratorio dei Santi Jacopo e Filippo via della Scala, 9

Oratorio dei Vanchetoni (Arciconfraternita di San Francesco) via Palazzuolo, 17

Oratorio di San Niccolò del Ceppo via dei Pandolfini, 5

Oratorio di Gesù Pellegrino (known as dei Pretoni) via San Gallo, on the corner with via degli Arazzieri

Oratorio della Confraternita di Sant’Antonio Abate (known as la Buca) via degli Alfani, 65r-67r

Oratorio della Compagnia di San Michele della Pace piazza Sant’Ambrogio

20

Oratories are small chapels used as places of worship and assembly by the confraternities, lay organisations of local citizens who met to pray, to organise processions and theatrical pieces, and to assist the poor and needy.

Oratorio della Compagnia di Santa Maria della Croce al Tempio via San Giuseppe note: these oratories, some of them deconsecrated, are open only on special occasions or for religious celebrations

Il Tabernacolo dei Linaioli dell’Angelico restaurato Biblioteca Monumentale di Michelozzo 22 March-12 June The initiative focuses on the return to its original site of the work of Beato Angelico after a long and complex restoration. Before being remounted in the Sala dell’Ospizio inside the marble frame designed by Lorenzo Ghiberti (this too restored), the Tabernacolo dei Linaioli will be on display in the Biblioteca Monumentale, a particularly appropriate setting for the enhancement of the work’s perspective qualities and imposing composition. Here the painting can be viewed from all angles and observed lower down than usual, just as the predella is exhibited separately to facilitate closer examination. An interactive multimedia installation allows in-depth exploration of the work and observation of decorative details that would hardly be noticeable with the naked eye. A video explains the restoration procedures and the technique of execution, particularly interesting as regards the representation of materials, while the display of textile fragments from the Renaissance period makes possible interesting comparisons with the fabrics actually painted. Another video provides information on the history of the work and the edifice that housed it, the Residenza dell’Arte dei Rigattieri, Linaioli e Sarti, once situated in the ancient heart of Florence and destroyed in the 19th century. The display of stone fragments and other objects, as well as paper and photographic documentation, contributes to illustrating the history of the original building, with a special museum route set up in the section of the museum dedicated to Firenze Antica.

event

European Museum Night

san marco museum

exhibition

he museum building, designed in 1436 by Michelozzo, occupies a vast area of the Dominican Convent of San Marco, which played an important role in the cultural and religious life of Florence, especially at the time of Savonarola, prior of San Marco. The museum owes its renown especially to the paintings of Fra’ Angelico, one of the great artists of the Renaissance, who made frescoes in many of the convent’s spaces. Other works by Fra’ Angelico were assembled here in the 20th century.

There is also an important collection of 16th-century paintings including works by Fra’ Bartolomeo. The museum has a section devoted to artefacts from buildings of the city centre that were demolished in the 19th century.

T

piazza San Marco, 3 open: Monday to Friday 8.15-13.50, Saturday, Sunday and holidays 8.15-16.50 closed: 1st, 3rd and 5th Sunday, 2nd and 4th Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/sanmarco

14 May The museum is participating in the night-time opening of museum institutions throughout Europe, with free admission for visitors. For the Museo di San Marco the 2011 edition focuses on the exhibition Il Tabernacolo dei Linaioli dell’Angelico restaurato.

restoration in progress frescoes in the Chiostro di Sant’Antonino (west end) • Beato Angelico, San Pietro da Verona invita al silenzio, lunette • Giovan Battista Vanni, La Fede e La Speranza, lunette other works • Beato Angelico, Lo sposalizio della Vergine and I funerali della Vergine, predella paintings on wood • Beato Angelico, Pala di San Marco, panel painting

works on loan • Benozzo Gozzoli, Cristo in Pietà con San Giovanni Evangelista e la Maddalena, Matrimonio mistico di Santa Caterina d’Alessandria, Sant’Antonio Abate, Sant’Egidio, predella, panel painting in: Castelfiorentino, Be.Go. Museo Benozzo Gozzoli, 30 April-31 July for the exhibition: “La città degli Uffizi 7”. Benozzo Gozzoli e Cosimo Rosselli nelle terre di Castelfiorentino. Pittura devozionale in Valdelsa • Beato Angelico, Imposizione del nome al Battista, panel painting; Francesco di Lorenzo Rosselli (attr.), Il martirio di Savonarola in Piazza della Signoria, panel painting in: Venaria Reale (Turin), Reggia di Venaria Reale, 17 March-11 September for the exhibition: La Bella Italia. Arte e identità delle città capitali

21

orsanmichele • museo degli innocenti 22

he history of the Istituto degli Innocenti in Florence began in 1419 with the foundation of the “Spedale”, or foundling hospital, built by the Silk-Makers Guild, thanks to a bequest from Francesco di Marco Datini, a merchant of Prato. The intention was to “begin a new place […] which will nourish children and allow them to grow up”. Culture and beauty have always been an integral part of the social and educational function of the Istituto degli Innocenti. The modernity of the Renaissance architecture and a new concept of child care were closely linked in the structure designed

by Brunelleschi. The museum, housing works such as the Adoration of the Magi by Adopt a work of art Domenico Ghirlandaio, a Virgin and Child by Luca della Robbia, the Virgin This is one of the most recent initiatives for the redesigning of the new and Saints by Piero di Cosimo, and a MUDI. The aim is to find new resources and splendid Virgin and Child by Sandro supporters to help finance the restoration of 24 works in a poor state of conservation Botticelli, is located in the gallery, belonging to the Istituto degli Innocenti. The originally the children’s living quarters, works, some of which have never been shown above the portico which enhances to the public, will subsequently form part of the museum’s new collection. the façade.

T

for information about the campaign: restaurimudi@istitutodeglinnocenti.it 335 1987642

piazza Santissima Annunziata, 12 open: every day 10-19 closed: 1 January, 25 December

www.istitutodeglinnocenti.it

exhibition

Il mercante, l’Ospedale, i fanciulli.

La donazione di Francesco Datini, Santa Maria Nuova e la fondazione degli Innocenti until 31 March The exhibition illustrates the remarkable welfare system that existed in Florence during the late Middle Ages and reconstructs events that led to the foundation of the Foundling Hospital, beginning with the last will and testament of Francesco Datini (1410). A small selection of works associated with hospitals and confraternities operating in the city at the time is for the first time put on display together with works by Lorenzo Ghiberti, Luca and Andrea della Robbia, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Piero di Cosimo.

uilt in the 13th century as a granary and market, in the next century Orsanmichele became a religious place and in the middle of the 14th century was consecrated for Christian worship. From then until the 17th century the building, which served both civil and religious functions, was modified and enriched by the city guilds with the fourteen canopied niches of the exterior. Religious services take place regularly, and concerts of classical music are held here, overlooked by the splendid marble tabernacle

by Orcagna and the 14th-century Madonna delle Grazie by Bernardo Daddi.

B

Sculpture Hall

On the first floor of Orsanmichele are the original statues from the tabernacles. Copies now occupy the niches in order to preserve the completeness of the decoration. On the upper floor are other small badly damaged statues that once formed part of the exterior. via dell’Arte della Lana open: Church every day 10-17 Museum Monday 10-17

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/orsanmichele

...before the year 1,000, in the very heart of the city, there was a piece of land used as a garden with an oratory dedicated to the Archangel Michael, which the Florentines called ‘San Michele in orto’, or more simply, Or’ San Michele

Santa Croce preserves the memory of the ‘making’ of a people through collecting the values and principles of a community. Preserving the memory of the lay saints of the civitas followed a particular development here: that of consecrating the church to become a ‘Pantheon’, a place of worship and preservation of memories, as well as a place to validate, promulgate and amplify the ‘examples’ it holds.

The cult of illustrious men During classical antiquity, monuments were erected and dedicated to kings, emperors, warriors, divinities. In the 14th century, the age-old tradition of the biographies of illustrious men gave rise to the custom of immortalizing men-at-arms or of religion, as well as men who had been examples of the contemporary virtues of a community or of a people. So returned the idea and project of creating places delegated and consecrated to being the temples of these new secular divinities: Pantheons, places housing all of the gods. In the liturgies and rituality of the church, the civil community thus found models of inspiration in the cult of the patron saints, alongside that of the illustrious men of the civitas.

T

piazza Santa Croce open: Monday to Saturday 9.30-17.30; Sunday, 6 January, 15 August, 1 November, 8 December 13-17.30 closed: 1 January, Easter, 13 June, 4 October, 25 and 26 December,

www.santacroceopera.it

project Nel nome di Michelangelo Itineraries linking the Casa Buonarroti and the Santa Croce Monumental Complex. The two places have an important link in Michelangelo. This initiative, begun in 2010, also highlights the importance of the Santa Croce quarter with cultural and promotional activities.

medici chapels

From city temple to “Temple of the Italian Glories” Santa Croce was originally the church where the major families of the district were buried. As of the late-14th century, monuments to the great chancellors of the Republic of Florence, Leonardo Bruni and Carlo Marsuppini – erected at the expense of the Signoria – entrusted Santa Croce with the function of preserving the “glories” of Florence. Cosimo de’ Medici resumed the tradition of great sepulchres with one for Michelangelo in 1564. There later followed the monuments to Niccolò Machiavelli and Galileo Galilei.

For the memories that Santa Croce preserves, Ugo Foscolo in his Dei sepolcri of 1807 considers and advocates this church as the site to consecrate to the great Italians (“Temple of the Italian Glories”), whose virtues must serve as inspiration to modern men. In the course of the 19th century, Santa Croce was thus transformed from city Pantheon to Pantheon of the Italians. The tombs dedicated to contemporaries confirm its fame as the privileged site to meditate on the illustrious figures and the new nation born of the Risorgimento.

santa croce monumental complex

Santa Croce: a history of Florence for the history of Italy

he Franciscan basilica of Santa Croce is a sort of open workshop that in seven hundred years has seen the most extraordinary religious, and civil events and contains an exceptional wealth in works of art. It contains the tombs of many great figures in Italian history, and is thus defined the ‘tempio delle itale glorie’.

A visit to the monumental complex includes: the Basilica, the cloisters and the early Renaissance Pazzi Chapel, the hall of 19thcentury funerary monuments, the exhibition devoted to the wood engraver Pietro Parigi, the great 20th-century Italian illustrator, the Museo dell’Opera, which includes the Sala del Cenacolo (Refectory), with important works including Cimabue’s Crucifix and Taddeo Gaddi’s frescoes of the Last Supper and the Albero della Vita.

State museum since 1869, the history of the Medici Chapels is tied to the history of the basilica of San Lorenzo to which they belong. The museum includes the New Sacristy, designed by Michelangelo, the Chapel of the Princes, a mausoleum in hard stone, the crypt, containing the tombs of the Medici grand dukes and their relatives, and the Lorraine crypt, with the tombs of the Lorraine princes and the funerary monument to Cosimo il Vecchio. The museum also displays items from the Treasury of the basilica of San Lorenzo.

A

piazza Madonna degli Aldobrandini, 6 open: 8.15-16.50 closed: 2nd and 4th Sunday, 1st, 3rd and 5th Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/cappellemedicee

civic museums

he Musei Civici Fiorentini are made up of a varied and comprehensive group of collections. Their function is to preserve and exhibit the rich heritage of Florentine art, encouraging its enjoyment by the general public. Belonging to this cultural patrimony are some of the most important Florentine churches, religious buildings and numerous collections donated by collectors, artists and city institutions.

T

www.museicivicifiorentini.it

Palazzo Vecchio

Palazzo Vecchio was built in 1299 as the seat of the standard bearer and ‘priore’ and became a ducal residence in the mid-16th century when Cosimo de’ Medici moved his court there. A tour includes the Michelozzo courtyard, the Salone dei Cinquecento, the Apartments of Leo X and of Eleonora di Toledo, the Sala degli Elementi, the Studiolo of Francesco I. Not to be missed are Verrocchio’s Putto, Donatello’s Judith, Michelangelo’s Genius of Victory and works by Vasari, Ghirlandaio, Salviati and Bronzino. piazza della Signoria open: every day 9-19, Thursday and mid-week holidays 9-14 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December At some times of the year there are evening openings, see:

www.museicivicifiorentini.it/palazzovecchio works on loan • Bartolomeo Ammannati, Opi in: Firenze, Bargello

for the exhibition: L’acqua, la pietra, il fuoco. Bartolomeo Ammannati scultore, until 18 September

Stefano Bardini Museum

Stefano Bardini (1854-1922) created a museum in the building he bought in 1881 to house his antiques’ business. The recent renovation entirely reflects the character of the collection as it was when Bardini left it to the city of Florence in 1922. Among more than two thousand paintings, sculptures and objects in the applied arts are Tino da Camaino’s Charity, Donatello’s Madonna dei Cordai, Antonio del Pollaiolo’s Michael Archangel, Guercino’s Atlas and Pietro Tacca’s famous bronze Porcellino. There is also an interesting collection of medallions, bronzes, oriental carpets, 15th-century marriage chests and the precious armoury.

The Roman Theatre of Florence (Palazzo Vecchio)

In 2010 the archaeological excavations in the ground below Palazzo Vecchio, which brought to light the remains of a Roman theatre (1st-2nd century AD), were completed. A series of galleries and walkways makes it possible to visit the fascinating vestiges of the ancient monument and the later medieval stratifications.

Guided visits by appointment only. The excavations are partially accessible to disabled visitors not in wheelchairs (and accompanied by carers), and are not accessible to children younger than 8 for safety reasons.

For information and booking: 055 2768224/2768558 info.museodeiragazzi@comune.fi.it

www.palazzovecchio-museoragazzi.it

Salvatore Romano Foundation

The museum in the historic refectory of the monastery of Santo Spirito houses sculptures, architectural fragments and wall paintings, mainly medieval, donated to the city in 1946 by the antiquarian Salvatore Romano.

via dei Renai, 37 open: Saturday, Sunday, Monday 11-17; group bookings Tuesday to Friday closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

piazza Santo Spirito, 29 open: Saturday, from April to October 9-17, from November to March 10.30-13.30 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

www.museicivicifiorentini.it/bardini

www.museicivicifiorentini.it/romano

works on loan • Hans Clemer, Madonna col Bambino (known as Madonna del coniglio) in: Caraglio (Cuneo), Museo del Filatoio for the exhibition: Animalia. Animali reali e fantastici nell’arte europea dal XV al XX secolo, until 5 June

24

At Palazzo Vecchio until 1 May For the Love of God, the diamond encrusted skull by Damien Hirst

• Giovanni Mannozzi, known as Giovanni da San Giovanni, Aurora e Titone; Scena di banchetto • Vincenzo Mannozzi, Figura allegorica

• Venetian work, Circular shield • Florentine work, Embossed chair covered in velvet • Florentine workshop, Cushion in red satin weave • Florentine workshop, Cushion in light blue silk in: San Giovanni Valdarno, Basilica di Santa Maria delle Grazie for the exhibition: Quiete, invenzione e inquietudine. Il Seicento fiorentino intorno a Giovanni da San Giovanni, until 12 June

The former home and studio of Rinaldo Carnielo (1853-1910) and the Collezioni del Novecento, that includes the Alberto Della Ragione Collection, the Fei-Rosai and the Palazzeschi donations, are temporarily closed.

Collezioni del Novecento works on loan • Enzo Faraoni, Ragazza sdraiata in: Florence, Gallery of Modern Art for the exhibition: Natura e verità nella pittura di Enzo Faraoni, until 30 April

The museum includes the cloisters decorated between the 14th and the 15th century – including the Chiostro Verde with important work by Paolo Uccello – , the Cappellone degli Spagnoli (Spanish Chapel), decorated with frescoes by Andrea di Bonaiuto, the Cappella degli Ubriachi and the Refettorio with the late 16th-century work of Alessandro Allori. piazza Santa Maria Novella open: Monday to Thursday and Saturday 9-17; mid-week holidays 9-14 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

www.museicivicifiorentini.it/smn

The Chiostro Verde in the Museum of Santa Maria Novella

On the right side of the basilica of Santa Maria Novella stand the monumental structures of the convent built to house the largest Dominican community in Florence, today partly used as a museum and partly occupied by the Scuola Marescialli e Brigadieri dei Carabinieri. Of the four cloisters forming part of the old convent complex, the most important in historical and artistic terms, and the only one presently open to the public, is the one situated immediately beyond the entrance hall of the museum, universally known as the Chiostro Verde.

The dark green of the cypress trees standing in the centre of the cloister contribute to making this place a charming haven of tranquillity in the heart of the city, just a stone’s throw from the main railway station, although the vegetation has no connection with the cloister’s traditional name. The unusual appellation derives from the prevailing colour of the pictures decorating three of the cloister’s four walls, executed with a singular chiaroscuro technique consisting of the use of a pigment of mineral origin called terra verde. The pigment was applied to form a uniform base that was decorated by delineating the outlines and volumes of the figures with different shades of green, white and black, the decorative details being finished off with a few other colours like yellow ochres and reds. The cloister was built in the 14th century, but the cycle in terra verde, representing the stories of Genesis, and totalling 70 scenes incorporated into more than 30 paintings, dates from the first half of the 15th century, approximately the same period in which Masaccio executed the lost fresco of the Sagra with the same technique in the complex of Santa Maria del Carmine. The fame of the pictorial cycle is associated mainly with the name of Paolo Uccello, who here frescoed at least two whole sections, providing in the scenes of the Flood and the Drunkenness of Noah remarkable evidence of his intellectual and almost ‘metaphysical’ vision of perspective. The artists of the other paintings, in all no less than four, and still partly anonymous, also deserve a special mention, being highly representative of the workshop-based artistic milieu of early 15th-century Florence.

Serena Pini Curator of the Museum of Santa Maria Novella

Cappella Brancacci

civic museums

Santa Maria Novella Museum

The 13th-century church of Santa Maria del Carmine houses the Cappella Brancacci, the masterpiece universally known for the frescoes of the cycle illustrating the Life of Saint Peter by Masaccio and Masolino. Executed in the years 1425-1427, the frescoes remained unfinished and were completed by Filippino Lippi between 1481 and 1482. A visit to the museum also includes the cloister and the Sala del Cenacolo housing the Last Supper by Alessandro Allori.

piazza del Carmine, 14 open: Monday and Wednesday to Saturday 10-17; Sunday and mid-week holidays 13-17 closed: 1 and 7 January, Easter, 1 May, 1 July, 15 August, 25 December

www.museicivicifiorentini.it/brancacci

The cloister of Santa Maria del Carmine and Masaccio’s lost Sagra in terra verde

Visitors entering the complex of the church and Convent to admire the Cappella Brancacci often fail to notice the cloister; however, a more attentive exploration of this peaceful little area of the church is a fitting introduction to a visit to the chapel. The cloister is a showcase of minor works and was formerly the site of an artistic masterpiece: the lost Sagra by Masaccio, originally frescoed “above the door leading into the convent”. The Sagra, illustrating the ceremony of the church’s consecration – which the painter had witnessed personally in 1422 – was executed by Masaccio during the years he worked on the Cappella Brancacci. The terra verde technique may have been chosen to confer a patina of antiquity to the scene’s contemporary setting, in which Brunelleschi, Donatello, Masolino and Masaccio can be recognised among those attending the ceremony. In the early Renaissance, according to Vasari, this technique was also appreciated for its ability to emulate the appearance of bronze or classical-style marble bas-relief. The Sagra, which was admired for its harmonious perspective and for the realism of the portraiture, represented a model for painters of later generations, as is demonstrated by the surviving 16th-century drawings that were copies of parts of it, one of which is attributed to Michelangelo. When the cloister was rebuilt at the beginning of the 17th century, the fresco was either covered over by plaster, or more probably destroyed, arousing the indignation of contemporary lovers of the fine arts. Attempts to trace it, from the 19th-century onwards, have all proved to be fruitless; thus, the old descriptions and the few fragmentary surviving drawings of it are all that remain of this pictorial manifesto of Humanism. A few years after Masaccio’s work, before 1431, Filippo Lippi began his artistic career in the Carmelite cloister with a fresco – identified as the Rule of the Carmelite Order on the basis of Vasari’s testimony – of which only a detached fragment remains (visible by request in the Sala della Colonna). The square cloister, with its columned portico built on two levels in 1597-1612, houses numerous medieval coats of arms belonging to Oltrarno families and some memorials of illustrious people. In the lunettes of the vaults is a cycle of frescoes dating from the 17th and 18th century illustrating scenes from the Carmelite legend, executed by such Florentine painters as Galeazzo Ghidoni, Domenico Bettini, Cosimo Ulivelli, Antonio Nicola Pillori and others. It is also worth visiting the room next to the ticket-office, to admire the splendid Last Supper painted by Alessandro Allori in 1582, at whose extremities are the portraits of the man who commissioned the work, Padre Luca da Venezia, and of another Carmelite friar.

Silvia Colucci Curator of the Cappella Brancacci Museum

25

house museums

Palazzo Davanzati An almost unique example of a typical 14thcentury Florentine house, which developed out of the medieval tower and preceded the appearance of the Renaissance palace. Built in the mid-14th century by the Davizzi family, during the 16th century it passed to the Bartolini and then in 1578 to the Davanzati who owned it until the late 1800s. In 1904 it was bought by an antique dealer named Elia Volpi who restored the palace and furnished it with items from his collection.

The palazzo was later bought by the State and opened to the public in 1956. The furnishings, paintings, tapestries and items of everyday use effectively recreate the interior of a noble Florentine house as it would have been from the 14th to the 17th century. There are also numerous paintings with secular and religious subjects including the triptych by Lorenzo Monaco and the 15th-century tondo decorated with the Gioco del Civettino (Game of the Fop)

by Giovanni di ser Giovanni known as lo Scheggia. Sculptures include Antonio Rossellino’s Bust of a young man. Of great interest is the collection of ceramics and majolica dating from the 14th to the 18th century and the rare wall decorations, such as those in the Sala dei Pappagalli and the room known as the bedroom of the Castellana di Vergy. via Porta Rossa, 13 open: every day 8.15-13.50 closed: 2nd and 4th Sunday, 1st, 3rd, 5th Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/davanzati

26

Wall decorations with plant motifs, Palazzo Davanzati

In Palazzo Davanzati the walls of some of the rooms are entirely covered in painting. Visitors are enveloped by the evocative medieval atmosphere of this old town house and at the same time can admire a unique expression of the decorative tastes that gave character to Florentine palazzi in the 14th century.

Unfortunately, there remain very few examples of this type of mural painting, in vogue in Florence from the 13th century and documented by both iconographical and literary sources, in addition to various fragments salvaged from the 19th-century demolition of the old city centre, now conserved in the Museo Davanzati and the Museo di San Marco. The decorative scheme, which is repeated throughout, consists of mock drapery embellished with geometric motifs, birds and heraldic devices, hanging from rings and lined with fur. Above the painted furnishings, an arched loggia gives the impression of an opening with a view onto a flowered garden with rose bushes and lush trees laden with fruit (probably citrus fruits and pomegranates), the whole scene brought to life by flying birds. In each of the four rooms of Palazzo Davanzati containing wall decorations we find the motif of the garden as a sort of trompe l’œil opening: in the Sala dei Pappagalli and in the Camera dell’Impannata the panels are enclosed by the columns of the painted loggia and by vases with the stems of lilies or roses resting on the false balustrade; in the Camera dei Pavoni the view overlooking the garden decorated with small roses, leaves and other multicoloured flowers, is framed by trilobate arches and shows an extremely varied assortment of birds of different sizes, most notably some majestic peacocks. Only in the Camera della Castellana does the naturalistic scene form the setting for the representation of a story. Various episodes of the Châtelaine de Vergy are narrated below the arches of the loggia running along the walls, and against the background of the garden. This romance of courtly love, which was very well-known at the time, derives from a French legend of the 13th century, although the paintings are based faithfully on a 14th-century Italian translation.

In this and in another room, the Camera dei Pavoni, the mock furnishing finishes above the level of the floor, leaving uncovered a charming strip of grass dotted with flowers which further enhances the illusion of an open space, vibrant, colourful and brimming with fragrant vegetation.

Maria Grazia Vaccari Director of the Palazzo Davanzati Museum

house museums

“in white veil with olive wreathed a virgin in my view appear’d, beneath green mantle robed in hue of living flame”

House of Dante The Casa di Dante we know today dates back to 1911 when the architect Giuseppe Castellucci reproduced a rather quaint medieval style building in the area in which the poet was said to have lived. The museum illustrates the life of Dante Alighieri and the Florence of his times. The Museo degli Originali includes a collection of medieval edged weapons, ceramics and objects once in daily use.

Purgatory XXX, 31-33

“Benign Apollo! this last labour aid; and make me such a vessel of thy worth, as thy own laurel claims, of me beloved” Paradise I, 13-15

“In fashion, as a snow white rose, lay then before my view the saintly multitude, which in His own blood Christ espoused”

via Santa Margherita, 1 open: Tuesday to Sunday 10-18 closed: Monday

www.museocasadidante.it

Paradise XXXI, 1-3 exhibitions

Rodolfo Siviero collezionista del sacro: calici, pissidi, ostensori curated by Diletta Corsini until 30 April The upper floor of Casa Siviero, currently closed to the public, holds an interesting group of liturgical objects that until now has never been exhibited or studied. After cataloguing, the furnishings are presented, with an explanation of their function and characteristics in a comparison with similar objects from the territory of Pontassieve.

Antonio Berti... e gli artisti fiorentini continuavano a nascere curated by Angela Sanna e Attilio Tori 10 June-30 November Siviero purchased various works by his sculptor friend Antonio Berti, which are today held in the house museum. The exhibition takes a close look at their relationship both through documents from the archives of Siviero, the Fondazione Berti, and the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, and with works by the sculptor illustrated in the writings of Siviero, or that saw him involved in the commissioning of them and in their display at collective exhibitions at the Accademia del Disegno.

competition

guided tours

first weekend of May awards in the

6 March and 10 April in the light of the

Young Collectors’ Competition

Luoghi insoliti

for young adults up to age 25.

All collections will be exhibited

initiative, exceptional opening with free guided tour booking required: luoghi.insoliti@regione.toscana.it

Museo di Casa Martelli Palazzo Martelli, which became a State museum in 1999, was opened to the public on 22 October 2009 to make available for general viewing the historic home and artistic collections of this noble family. At the beginning of the 16th century the Martelli, bankers and allies of the Medici, bought a property that was to grow in the following years. Since the 17th century the first floor has housed an art collection that today retains its original arrangement. This house museum is, therefore, not the result of a posthumous reconstruction but derives from the centuries-old stratification of a family’s life. via Zannetti, 8 open: Thursday afternoon and Saturday morning by appointment

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/casamartelli

Museo Casa Rodolfo Siviero

The Casa Siviero was built in the neoRenaissance style in 1875, the year the new lungarno Serristori was completed.

Rodolfo Siviero, known as the “James Bond of the art world” for his important contribution in ensuring that many stolen works of art were returned to Italy, bought the building in 1944 and lived there until 1983. He left the house and its furnishings to the Regione Toscana on the condition it became a public museum. In the collection are works by Soffici, Annigoni, Manzù and Berti, as well as by Giorgio de Chirico who was very attached to this house.

lungarno Serristori, 1-3 open: Saturday, from October to May 10-18, from June to September 10-14 and 15-19; Sunday and Monday, all year 10-13 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 24 June, 15 August, 25 and 26 December

www.museocasasiviero.it

performance 9 July on the occasion of the

Notti dell’archeologia in the garden of Casa Siviero, a performance with an archaeological theme, based on texts relating to the myth of the Argonauts, in particular the stories of Hylas and of Medea

Casa Guidi After their secret marriage (1846) the poets Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning fled to Italy and lived in Florence until Elizabeth’s death (1861); the house was bought in 1971 by the Browning Institute of New York which restored the apartments, filling them with objects and furniture, some of which once belonged to the couple. piazza San Felice, 8 open: from 1 April to 30 November, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 15-18

27

archaeological museums

National Archaeological Museum

In 1881 the museum was transferred to the 17th-century Palazzo della Crocetta, built for Cosimo II’s sister, Maria Maddalena de’ Medici.

Over time it has acquired masterpieces from the Medici and Lorraine collections and fine examples of art from the Greek, Etruscan and Roman periods, flanked by the important Egyptian Museum collection. Among the large bronzes not to be missed are the Chimera, found near Arezzo in 1553, and the Etruscan Aule Meteli, known as L’Arringatore. The collection of rare figured ceramics is equally prestigious and includes the large black figure François Vase (c. 570 BC). The Museum also has an important group of rare Etruscan funerary artefacts, with urns from the areas around Chiusi and Volterra and stone and marble tomb sculptures, including the famous painted Amazon sarcophagus (4th century BC).

The Egyptian Museum of Florence, second only in Italy to the Turin museum, is also housed here. It is made up of Medici and Lorraine collections and from 1880 was further enriched by Ernesto Schiaparelli, private donors and scientific institutions.

focus / the

Garden of the National Archaeological Museum

piazza Santissima Annunziata, 9/b open: Monday 14-19, Tuesday and Thursday 8.30-19, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday 8.30-14 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

www.firenzemusei.it/archeologico

exhibition

Antichi signori di Maremma

until 30 April An exhibition of the most significant materials and equipment illustrating the history of Tyrrhenian Etruria from Populonia to Vulci.

Drawing showing constructions in the museum garden, from Il giardino del Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Firenze. Guida, a cura di A. Romualdi, Firenze 2000

The history of the garden The early layout of the garden of the Medicean Palazzo della Crocetta dates back to the first half of the 18th century when by order of the Regent, Prince of Craon, the gardener of Boboli Francesco Romoli was instructed to divide the space into rectangular beds, bordered by elements in terracotta and sandstone. Later interventions did not modify the substance of this layout until 1885, when the garden was incorporated into the Archaeological Museum that several years earlier had been instituted in Palazzo della Crocetta. From that moment, the garden became the logical complement of the museum installation, in the intentions of the museum’s first director Adriano Milani who transformed it into an archaeological area connected to the exhibition halls where, in 1898, the Central Topographical Museum of Etruria was set up. Opened to the public in 1902 in the presence of Queen Margherita, the garden became the site of several monumental tombs from Veio, Vetulonia, Casale Marittimo, Chianciano and Orvieto, which were disassembled and reconstructed there. Copies were also made of the Inghirami tomb, discovered at Volterra in 1861, and of the Velii tomb of Orvieto. The intention was to document the principal types of funerary architecture used by the Etruscans from the Orientalising period to the Hellenistic era, creating a veritable open-air museum, an extraordinary learning trail through the Etruscan grave structures immersed in vegetation. The garden also originally hosted the collection of Roman statues that Milani had managed to obtain from the Uffizi Gallery. The collection of classical sculptures was set up beneath the arches of the Medicean corridor and along the garden lanes, while numerous memorials, stelae, sarcophagi, urns and funerary monuments from various parts of Etruria were set up in the beds. The new project to enlarge the rooms of the museum was approved in 1925. It provided for the opening of an entrance on piazza Santissima Annunziata, and the placing of the classical sculpture section in rooms in the Spedale degli Innocenti, acquired in the 1930s. Between 1929 and 1940 the sculptures were removed from the arches of the Gallery, which were then walled up to build new rooms along the via Laura side, while in 1932 a modern little temple inspired by a cultic aedicule found in Vulci was built in the middle of the garden. Currently, the garden still preserves what in general terms was Milani’s layout, though very few sculptures have remained outside, prey to atmospheric agents, as Milani’s successor Antonio Minto had already realised in the 1920s. On the contrary, numerous tombs from all over Etruria remained where they were, along with memorials and sarcophagi that complete the installation of this ‘Architectural Section’ dedicated to Etruscan funerary monuments.

28

Carlotta Cianferoni

Director of the National Archaeological Museum in Florence

Villa Corsini, on the western outskirts of Florence in the Castello district, was acquired by Grand Duke Cosimo III’s adviser Filippo Corsini in 1697 who handed over reconstruction to Giovan Battista Foggini. In 1968 the villa was given to the Italian State. The villa was used for storage by the Soprintendenza Archeologica della Toscana and has now been completely restored to display an important group of antique sculptures, including the recently restored Arianna dormiente and the Apollo saettante. The Antiquarium shows the results of research on objects found locally, dating from the Iron Age to the Roman period. via della Petraia, 38 open: Saturday and Sunday 9.30-13 closed: 1 January, 25 and 26 December

The “Paolo Graziosi” Florentine Museum and Institute of Prehistory Created in 1946, the museum collects, classifies and conserves the prehistoric collections once scattered throughout the city of Florence. The library consists of about 3,000 volumes.

via Sant’Egidio, 21 open: Monday 14-17, Tuesday and Thursday 9.30-16.30, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday 9.30-12.30 closed: 1 January, Easter and Easter Monday, 1 May, the week of the 15 August, 24-26 and 31 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/villacorsini

www.museofiorentinopreistoria.it

Parco Archeologico di Carmignano

The new centre of archaeology brings together in a single system the Museo Archeologico di Artimino and the various Etruscan sites of the area. The four main sites in the Archaeological Park are the Artimino necropolis at Prato Rosello, the fortified settlement of Pietramarina, the Tumulus of Montefortini and the Tomba dei Boschetti at Comeana. The Museo Archeologico di Artimino exhibits a collection of finds discovered in the area of Carmignano and arranged according to topographical and chronological criteria in two sections dedicated to the “world of the living” and the “world of the dead”.

Museo Archeologico di Artimino piazza San Carlo, Artimino open: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday 9.30-13, Saturday and Sunday 10-13 and 15-18 closed: Easter, 15 August, 25 December

www.parcoarcheologicocarmignano.it

archaeological museums

Villa Corsini

Opening 26 March

exhibition

Prima di Firenze.Uomo e ambiente nella preistoria dell’area fiorentina until 31 December 2013 The exhibition, contained within the educational museum trail, explains the prehistory of the Florentine area before the arrival of the Etruscans.

29

palazzo strozzi

ituated between piazza Strozzi and via Tornabuoni in the heart of Florence, the Palazzo Strozzi is one of the finest examples of Renaissance architecture. It was commissioned by the Florentine merchant Filippo Strozzi and the foundations were laid in 1489 according to a design perhaps by Benedetto da Maiano. The Palazzo was finished in 1538. It remained the property of the Strozzi family until 1937, and since 1999 it has been managed by the City of Florence. Since the Second World War the Palazzo has been Florence’s largest temporary exhibition space. In April 2006 the City of Florence, the Province, the Chamber of Commerce and an association of private partners joined forces to create the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi with the task of managing the public spaces of the Palazzo.

The Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi represents an innovation in the governance of Italian cultural institutions. The key challenge of the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi is to bring an international approach to making culture in Florence, to provide a platform for experimentation, to create a place for debate and discussion, to create new synergies with other cultural players and to be a catalyst for culture – in short, to ‘think global, act local’. The Palazzo Strozzi hosts two major exhibitions annually, and is open year-round with a permanent exhibition on the history of the Palazzo Strozzi.

S

exhibition

Picasso, Miró, Dalí.

Giovani e arrabbiati: la nascita della modernità curated by Eugenio Carmona and Christoph Vitali 12 March-17 July With more than 60 early works by Picasso, Miró and Dalí, and more than 100 sketches by Picasso from Spain, the Metropolitan and private collections, this show traces the common roots of a style that made the fame of three artists and their desire to rebel against convention. The intermediary between the works is Cahier 7, here exhibited integrally for the first time outside of Spain, which represented very strong stimuli for Dalí and Miró, and marked the birth of the language of modern art. Going back over a period of 30 years, the exhibition opens with works that reference Dalí’s presumed visit to Picasso in Paris (1926), then presents the birth of modernity in the replies of Dalí and Miró, highlights the encounter of Miró and Picasso (1917), and finally ends prior to the latter’s arrival in France (1900). The exhibition closes with the Weeping Woman by Picasso (1937), the Geometric Composition by Miró (1933), and Harlequin by Dalí (1926), which show the persisting influence of Cahier 7.

piazza Strozzi open: every day 9-20, Thursday 9-23

www.palazzostrozzi.org

families at Palazzo Strozzi activities for families on the occasion of the exhibition.

See p. 54

upcoming

Il denaro e la bellezza.

I banchieri, Botticelli e il rogo delle vanità curated by Ludovica Sebregondi and Tim Parks 17 September 2011-22 January 2012 Masterpieces by Botticelli, Beato Angelico, Piero del Pollaiolo, the Della Robbia and Lorenzo di Credi illustrate how the flourishing of the modern banking system ran parallel to the greatest artistic season of the western world. .

www.palazzo-medici.it www.provincia.fi.it

alazzo Medici Riccardi is one of the most important buildings in Florence, due to its central position, its grandeur and beauty, because of the artistic treasures it conserves – notably, the celebrated Procession of the Magi by Benozzo Gozzoli – and because of the recently enlarged museum it houses. Palazzo Medici Riccardi is also the seat of various offices of the Provincia di Firenze and offers Florentine citizens and tourists a rich and varied programme of cultural events in both the city and its surrounding area.

P

Spring at Palazzo Medici Riccardi: exhibitions, performances, music and art in Florence and its surrounding area The sounds and colours of Florence in springtime and summer are special and unmistakable, and a walk through the city during these months is truly a unique experience that anyone would want to repeat again and again. At Palazzo Medici Riccardi, headquarters of the Provincia di Firenze, numerous events, performances and exhibitions are organised to celebrate the arrival of the warm season and offer cityfolk and visitors opportunities for cultural enrichment and enjoyment.

exhibitions

Pietro Annigoni: un’arte per l’uomo Museo Mediceo and Limonaia until 12 April This exhibition marks the end of the celebrations for the centenary of the birth of Annigoni, a painter very strongly linked to Florence. The artist’s life and artistic production are reconstructed through portraits and selfportraits, paintings touching on Verismo and Metaphysics, landscapes and ‘vedute’, gouaches, sanguines and fresco studies. The takings from the sale of the catalogue will be devolved to the ‘Amici di Pietro Annigoni Foundation’ for solidarity among peoples, and to support the development of projects associated with the people of Burkina Faso.

Wolakota: amicizia col popolo Lakota Sioux Sale Istituto Storico della Resistenza 11-20 April A week packed with events focusing on the history, culture and spiritual traditions of the Sioux Indians. The event has been organised by the Provincia di Firenze and the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, with the collaboration of the Wambli Gleska cultural association. Events include the ethnographical exhibition of original Indian artefacts, lectures, debates and film projections.

outside Florence

Benozzo Gozzoli e Cosimo Rosselli nelle terre di Castelfiorentino.

Pittura devozionale in Valdelsa Castelfiorentino, Be.Go. Museo Benozzo Gozzoli 30 April-31 July The exhibition is part of the ‘La città degli Uffizi’ project which takes works from the Florentine Gallery to be shown in smaller towns of the surrounding area. For those visiting the exhibition at Castelfiorentino, reduced admission into Palazzo Medici Riccardi to admire Benozzo Gozzoli’s masterpiece The Procession of the Magi.

For information: www.lacittadegliuffizi.org

palazzo medici riccardi

via Cavour, 3 open: every day 9-19 closed: Wednesday bookings: 055 2760340

contemporary art Palazzo Medici Riccardi hosts from March to July a series of shows devoted to contemporary art.

Antonio Vinciguerra 25 March-25 April

Marco Dolfi 28 April-20 May

Dino Caponi 5 May-7 June

Ottone Rosai 12 May-21 June

Umberto Mariani 16 June-17 July

Genio del Territorio returns! find out about all the events here: www.genioterritorio.it

Cresce la cultura!

Arriva il PIC The Provincia promotes the development of culture with initiatives and events throughout the local area.

Thanks to the regional Piano Integrato per la Cultura, contemporary art, festivals, painting and sculpture events are now even more numerous. Among the events of summer 2011: Estate Fiesolana, Luglio Bambino at Campi Bisenzio, TusciaElecta and many many more.

31

edited by Gabriele Ametrano

in the now

Gabriele Ametrano is a journalist who collaborates on the cultural pages of the ‘Corriere Fiorentino’ (local section of the ‘Corriere della Sera’) and with national magazines (‘Indice dei Libri’, ‘Exibart’, ‘Edison Square’). Since 2008 he has chaired two literary programmes on the Rete Toscana Classica. gabriele.ametrano@gmail.com

Monitoring the future of culture is becoming more and more difficult, both in Florence and in the rest of the country. Contemporary art suffers from a shortage of funds, while cuts in financial backing mean that many artistic groups have problems creating six-monthly programmes. In these pages we have given visibility to those places in the city and at a regional level working in the application of interdisplinary approaches. We have focused on initiatives that most represent contemporary culture, places or associations that encourage and stimulate the international exchange of ideas and projects. Many of these have organised events that are already scheduled, others have yet to be confirmed; visitors may consult the updated programmes in the websites indicated.

Michele Dantini, “The World Bank”, Centro di cultura contemporanea Strozzina 2009 © Michele Dantini

in the now dates Premio Maretti Memorial Valerio Riva

Suspense. Sculture sospese

music@villaromana Echoes

13 March-25 April Centro Pecci

until 8 May Ex3

25 May

Videolibrary

LIVE! Quando arte e rock cambiano il mondo

until 10 April EX3

Tomoaki Suzuki Maria Antonietta Mameli 14 April-4 June Museo Marino Marini

Open Studios 02

14-17 June Fondazione Pitti Immagine Discovery, Fortezza da Basso

until 28 May organised by CCCStrozzina

Africa: See you, See me

20-22 May organised by Tempo Reale, FKL e EX3

Premio Talenti Emergenti until 1 May CCCStrozzina

9 June Villa Romana

Pitti Uomo

music@villaromana Modal

until 22 April organised by the New York University La Pietra Policy Dialogues, the NYU Africana Studies and the Fondazione Studio Marangoni FSMgallery

music@villaromana Gramsci-Keats

15 May-31 July Centro Pecci

Keep an ear on...

International conference on the landscape of sound

18 April Villa Romana

32

EX3

Identità virtuali 21 May-17 July CCCStrozzina

Fabbrica Europa May Stazione Leopolda

Pitti Bimbo 23-25 June Fondazione Pitti Immagine Discovery, Fortezza da Basso

Festival delle colline June-July Centro Pecci

Videominuto September Centro Pecci

Athos Ongaro: Abracadabra September Centro Pecci

Organises solo shows of Italian and international artists and offers workshops, seminars and events to interact with the different languages of the contemporary. viale Giannotti, 81/83/85 open: Wednesday to Sunday 11-19, Friday 11-20

www.ex3.it

exhibition

Suspense.

Sculture sospese until 8 May A collective exhibition focusing on the concept of ‘suspension’ in relation to contemporary sculptural production.

event

Videolibrary until 10 April Archive film belonging to EX3 showing international artists such as Cindy Sherman, Maurizio Cattelan, Bill Viola and Hiroshi Sugimoto.

Tempo Reale Fondazione Fabbrica Europa per le Arti Contemporanee The Fabbrica Europa project is a cultural festival that takes place in May in the Stazione Leopolda and other spaces in the city. On the programme are theatrical performances, concerts, dance, workshops and discussion. borgo degli Albizi, 15

www.ffeac.org

Fondazione Studio Marangoni

A European reference point for research, production and education in new music technologies. It collaborates with important Tuscan music festivals, offering performances by international artists who have explored the confines of auditory experience. www.temporeale.it

via San Niccolò, 18r

via Faenza, 111

www.pittimmagine.com www.stazioneleopolda.com

Lo Schermo dell’Arte

A cultural association promoting the making of films on contemporary art, exploring the relationship between cinema and art in all its forms. The major project is an international festival of film on contemporary art that takes place every year during the ‘50 giorni di Cinema Internazionale’ (50 days of International Cinema).

Villa Romana

Base

Cultural association and Fashion, visual arts, cinema, art gallery, supports in-depth photography, advertising, architecture research and collaboration and music all come together in Florence with international artists. in the events organised by Pitti Immagine. www.baseitaly.org

Stazione Leopolda viale Fratelli Rosselli, 5

Villa Strozzi via Pisana, 77

via Giovan Battista Niccolini, 3/e The FSM fosters the art and www.schermodellarte.org teaching of contemporary photography with courses, workshops and conferences. Alongside the teaching, the FSM organises exhibitions in Italy and abroad.

A centre for artistic education independent via San Zanobi, 32r and 19r www.studiomarangoni.it of official curricula.

It houses international artists on an annual basis.

Fondazione Pitti Immagine Discovery

Musicus Concentus Explores the new scene in electronic music, offering concerts and other musical encounters throughout Tuscany. piazza del Carmine, 19

www.musicusconcentus.com

Switch Creative Social Network

Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze

A prestigious institution, founded in 1784, today committed to developing the creative potential of its young students with university level courses that stimulate the search for artistic expressions and contemporary forms of art in the wake of the great Florentine artistic tradition. via Ricasoli, 66

www.accademia.firenze.it

Cantieri Goldonetta

Urban creativity, musical experimentation and artistic entertainment. Switch offers meetings with musicians, deejays, urban writers and digital artists in a continual dialogue with the development of the city.

Performance, residential workshops. The place for research into body language. Also the home of the Accademia sull’arte del gesto, devoted to exploring dance for children.

In the summer it organises the Festival Oltrarno Atelier.

via Scipio Slapater, 2

via Santa Maria, 23-25

www.switchproject.net

www.cango.fi.it

via Senese, 68

www.villaromana.org

THINKING ABOUT THE FUTURE

Our environment is a precious gift we need to preserve.

Our company too is trying to reduce pollution and the use of non-renewable resources, as well as trying to slow down the climate changes. At our establishment in Badia al Pino, we have just installed 5,500 square metres of photovoltaic panels, enough to produce autonomously 300 KW of electric energy, the equivalent amount required for about 100 families. The surplus of energy we produce is discharged on the general electric energy net.

We invest in the future with the interest of the next generations at heart.

www.caffecorsini.it

in the now

Centro di Cultura Contemporanea Strozzina

Created in 2007 as part of the Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi, the centre houses exhibition projects of contemporary art which explore themes and modes of expression with an interdisciplinary approach through meetings, debates, conferences, workshops and video projections. Strozzina activity is distinguished by a programme expressly centred on the artistic developments of recent years, favouring multimedia projects and relational and interactive forms of art. piazza Strozzi open: Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday to Sunday 10-20, Thursday 10-23 closed: Monday

www.strozzina.org

exhibitions Premio Talenti Emergenti 2011 until 1 May On show the work of 16 young artists selected by 4 Italian critics and curators, giving an opportunity to become acquainted with the new explorations and trends of Italian contemporary art. The show is joined by a series of lectures held by experts, which thus opens a direct dialogue with the public.

Identità virtuali organised in consultation with Antonio Glessi, Christiane Feser, Franziska Nori and Roberto Simanowski 21 May-17 July An analysis of the term ‘identity’, in light of the growing role played by digital technology and new forms of communication. The exhibition presents works and installations by international artists which reflect on the political, social and cultural implications – as well as on the impact on everyday life – of the new relationship between man and technology in the sign of “virtual identities” that we increasingly use to confront reality.

events Open studios 02 until 28 May

An exhibition space devoted to contemporary art. The collection of the artist Marino Marini’s own works is permanently on show, along with exhibits, and in-depth learning and training activities. It also collaborates with the Fondazione Pitti Immagine Discovery.

From 14 April to 4 June Tomoaki Suzuki and Maria Antonietta Mameli. piazza San Pancrazio open: Monday and Wednesday to Saturday 10-17 closed: Tuesday, Sunday, August and holidays

www.museomarinomarini.it

Part of the toscanaincontemporanea project promoted by the Regione Toscana, this exhibition offers the possibility to discover the sites of contemporary art by visiting the studios of 18 artists who live and work in Tuscany. booking required; off-calendar group visits can be booked on request to: a.tempesti@palazzostrozzi.org 055 2776461

Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci In addition to the permanent collection of works, the Centre periodically stages temporary exhibitions, workshops and events. viale della Repubblica, 277, Prato open: Monday, Wednesday to Sunday 10-19, 1 January 15-19 closed: 25 and 31 December

www.centropecci.it

Museo Marino Marini

events Festival delle colline June-July music festival

Videominuto September one-minute video festival

exhibitions Premio Maretti Memorial Valerio Riva in collaboration with the Fondazione Valerio Riva 13 March-25 April The third year of the only national prize devoted to Italian artists over the age of 35.

LIVE! Quando arte e rock cambiano il mondo curated by Marco Bazzini and Luca Beatrice 15 May-31 July 14 concerts and 14 exhibitions, 40 years of history, over 50 works, including film, video, memorabilia and ephemera trace the new linguistics, the social and cultural events on the international stage.

Athos Ongaro Abracadabra September

34

Ongaro, champion of a return to an art “based on the innocence of ancient culture” presents his well-known sculpture with painting on show for the first time.

“Pic-nic allée”, 2000 Photo Massimo Vitali courtesy of the artist

in the now

Michele Dantini

in conversation with Gabriele Ametrano

Artist, art critic, writer. Michele Dantini’s work cannot be contained within a single category, it invariably ranges well beyond the confines of any given sector. His projects investigate the ecological and anthropological elements of the landscape, marrying artistic expression with a historical and environmental experience of chosen places.

Green areas and politics Green areas represent man’s right to citizenship. We descend from tree-living primates, we evolved in tree-filled savannas, this type of environment forms part of our mentality. Modern life and democracy have provided citizens with green spaces in response to that growing need to ‘come and go’ from the city without actually leaving it. Today the contact with parks and gardens can fulfil our desire for nature.

The most far-sighted public administrations now invest in the creation of gardens and green areas, even very small ones, and ‘ecological corridors’ for spontaneously growing plants and microfauna: they are careful not to neglect narrow spaces, cavities and edges, like rooftops or the tracks of electric city trams and trains, etc. In Italy sensitivity toward public environments is less developed than in other European or North American countries, particularly as regards ‘waste land’ and ‘the wild’.

Green areas and art In the last 40 years we have seen a proliferation of ‘sculpture parks’, of green areas invaded by ‘art’ works installed in the landscape without any connection to the place or to its natural processes.

Today I see the ‘park with sculptures’ as an archaic and misleading model of interaction between man and the environment, a model that responds to needs and considerations of a celebrative character that have little or nothing to do with us, and reveals an underlying ecological ignorance. Artists can contribute to the creation of ecological infrastructures, make contributions in mild and ‘conceptual’ ways. The Tate Modern, in recent years, held a competition for the project of the best ‘house’ for bats. We can choose to smile smugly at such initiatives, or we can consider them differently. Bats are important biological indicators, formidable predators of mosquitoes, with no controindications. Their protection in cities is objectively a real advantage and dissolves centuriesold prejudices. Elsewhere, efforts have been made to prevent the massacre of tiny animals that cross the road in search of water or sexual partners, or simply migrate in search of food, by creating ecological underpasses. Badgers, hedgehogs, foxes and squirrels, not to speak of amphibians and insects: how many do we see killed on the roads? The most innovative landscape architects design parks and gardens with spontaneously growing plants: these require less tending, from an evolutionary viewpoint, are the most appropriate in the context, and have advantages in terms of sustainability. Do we really need to encourage the over-production of artistic objects, often on a monumental scale? It’s not a question of doing away with redundant artistic and collectionistic egos, but opening up to the discovery and recognition of nature’s nobility, extending ‘citizenship’ to plants and animals. Thus drawing nearer to that most sensational work of art: Gaia.

Michele Dantini is interested in projects that connect art, ecology and reflection on the ‘public sphere’. His works are expressed in different styles and mediums – photography, drawing, installations, videos – and explore the dialogue between word and image. They focus on experiences of mobility and dislocation on the one hand, and mental processes on the other. Among his most recent exhibitions: La revanche de l’archive photographique, Centre de la Photographie (Geneva, 2010); Torinover. SOS Planet (Turin/Glasgow/Nagoya/Rotterdam/Salt Lake City, 2010-2011); Zmeiniy Project, Tsekh Gallery (Kiev, 2010); Iconography of Climate Change, Studio 9:43 @ The Distillery (Boston, 2009); Green Platform. Arte Ecologia Sostenibilità, Centro di Cultura Contemporanea Strozzina (Florence, 2009); Untitled, Galleria Alessandro De March (Milan, 2009); Cythère, Villa Bardini (Florence, 2008); 1988. Vent’anni prima, vent’anni dopo, Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci (Prato, 2008); Bardini Boboli Project, Giardino Bardini (Florence, 2007). On 24 March he inaugurates his new work at the SRISA Gallery in via San Gallo 53r in Florence, curated by Rebecca Olsen.

Michele Dantini, “Baedeker”, TusciaElecta 2007 © Michele Dantini

35

medici villas

Parco mediceo di Pratolino Villa Demidoff original owner: the Medici family. modified by: Francesco I de’ Medici (1568); Ferdinando III of Lorraine (1819); Leopoldo II of Lorraine (1837); Paolo Demidoff (1870). Acquired by the Florentine provincial administration in 1981, destined for public use. architecture: the Medici Villa, designed by Buontalenti and demolished in 1822, was inside a large park that, with its water games, automatons and fountains, was imitated all over Europe.

The existing Villa Demidoff was adapted from the paggeria while the transformation of the garden into an English park was carried out by Joseph Fritsch in the Lorraine period. to see: the park with its centuries-old trees; some of the aspects of the park of the Buontalenti period including the Colossus of the Appenines and the Mugnone grotto (Giambologna), the Cupid grotto (Buontalenti, 1577) the Casino di Montili (Cambray Digny, c. 1820) and the chapel on a hexagonal plan (Buontalenti, 1580).

via Fiorentina, 282, località Pratolino, Comune di Vaglia

By car: there is a large unattended car park.

By bus: ATAF, SITA and CAP lines, all leaving from the area around Santa Maria Novella railway station.

Entrance to the park is free. open: from April to October.

In April and October, Sunday and holidays 10-17; in May and September, Saturday, Sunday and holidays 10-18; from June to August, Saturday, Sunday and holidays 10-19 The opening of the park is subject to weather conditions.

Groups of residents and visitors can request to see the central area of the park on days when the park is generally closed: parcpra@provincia.fi.it 055 409427

www.provincia.fi.it/pratolino

original owner: Lorenzo and Giovanni di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici (from 1477). modified by: Cosimo I. architecture: the villa is one of the oldest Medici family suburban residences, altered, with its garden, in the 16th century, under the supervision of Tribolo, Vasari and Buontalenti. to see: the terraced garden, considered by Vasari to be one of the most magnificent in Europe, is well worth the visit, as are Ammannati’s Fountain of Hercules and Antaeus and the Grotta degli Animali. via di Castello, 47 - Loc. Castello open: from November to February 8.15-16.30, in March 8.15-17.30, in April, May, September, October 8.15-18.30, from June to August 8.15-19.30 closed: 2nd and 3rd Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/villacastello

Villa medicea di Cerreto Guidi

original owner: Cosimo I de’ Medici. architecture: the villa was built in 1556 as a hunting residence and garrison for the area, to a plan attributed to Bernardo Buontalenti. to see: became a museum in 1978 and houses furniture and portraits of members of the Medici family (16th and 17th century); since 2002 it has housed a Historic Museum of Hunting and the Countryside.

36

via dei Ponti Medicei, 7, Cerreto Guidi open: every day, 8.15-19 closed: 2nd and 3rd Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/cerretoguidi

Villa medicea della Petraia

original owner: the Brunelleschi family; the Strozzi family. modified by: Cardinal Ferdinando de’ Medici. architecture: the building came into the possession of Ferdinando in the second half of the 16th century and was modified by Giulio Parigi in the 17th century. to see: the interior decoration and 19th-century furnishings and interesting decoration; the ballroom with frescoes by Volterrano (17th century); the formal garden planned by Niccolò Tribolo and the fountain with Giambologna’s Fiorenza, transferred from the Villa di Castello. via della Petraia, 40 - Loc. Castello open: every day, from November to February 8.15-16.30, in March 8.15-17.30, in April, May, September, October 8.1518.30, from June to August 8.15-19.30 closed: 2nd and 3rd Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/petraia

exhibition

Preziosi tesori in villa until 10 September For this special occasion the Medicean villa exhibits the Coronation of the Virgin, a work produced in Botticelli’s workshop and part of the still little-known patrimony of the former Conservatorio delle Montalve, housed at the Florence University owned Villa La Quiete.

The display of some valuable 18th-century altar fronts is further evidence of the artistic importance of the La Quiete collection.

© Benini-Calandri

Villa medicea di Castello

events

Palazzo Medici Riccardi’s “green� initiatives Every year the beautiful park and villa are the venue for numerous events intended for the public at large. Exhibitions, conventions, agricultural fairs, stage performances and food and wine tastings are just some of the meetings held in the Medici park. One of the most important of these events is Ruralia, the celebrated annual fair organised by the Provincia di Firenze that usually takes place on the last weekend in May with a display of the most innovative and interesting developments in the rural world, agriculture and the environment, accompanied by exhibitions of the best on offer in the livestock sector as well as typical products of our splendid territory. The attractions are not limited to the agricultural world however.

Ruralia is an enjoyable day out for families and children, with plenty on offer in the way of games, recreational, educational and gastronomic events: horse riding, cattle shows and environmental treasure hunts, to name but a few. A second edition of Ruralia is held in the Florentine Parco delle Cascine at the beginning of autumn. Ruralia 2011 will draw inspiration from the commemoration of the 150 years of the Unification of Italy and will feature innovations that over the last century and a half have affected the world of agriculture. info: www.provincia.fi.it/pratolino

medici villas

Villa medicea di Poggio a Caiano

original owner: Lorenzo il Magnifico. architecture: the villa was built to a plan by Giuliano da Sangallo and reflects the humanist trends in architecture inspired by classical antiquity (1485-1492); the building was completed in the first half of the 16th century under Giovanni, then Pope Leo X. to see: frescoes by Andrea del Sarto, Pontormo, Franciabigio and Alessandro Allori. piazza Medici, 14, Poggio a Caiano open: every day, from November to February 8.15-16.30, in March and October 8.15-17.30 (official summer time 18.30), in April, May, September 8.15-18.30, from June to August 8.15-19.30 closed: 2nd and 3rd Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/poggiocaiano

Museo della Natura Morta (Still Life Museum)

The first Still Life Museum in Italy exhibits, in the room of the Villa medicea di Poggio a Caiano, around two hundred paintings dating from the 16th to the 18th century and belonging to the Medici Collections.

Reservation required 055 877012 Accompanied visits (not guided), every hour, begin at 9 and continue throughout the day (excluding lunchtime between 13 and 14)

exhibition

Le cacce dei Granduchi

until 8 May On show in the Salone di Leone X, the Swan Hunt and the Wild Goose Hunt (1577-1578), made to designs by Alessandro Allori, belong to a series of tapestries commissioned for the villa of Poggio a Caiano. The former, restored, is the only one to have remained in its original position, while the other, subjected to conservational maintenance, comes from the Tapestries Repository of Palazzo Pitti.

Accompanied visits (not guided), every hour from 8.30

37

bardini villa and garden

he Fondazione Parchi Monumentali Bardini e Peyron was founded in 1998 by the Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze following the restoration project targeting the Bardini buildings, begun in the 1990s. The Bardini complex includes the 17th-century villa and large park: 4 hectares of woods, gardens and orchards reaching to the medieval walls of the city, between costa San Giorgio and borgo San Niccolò. The garden and the Villa are open all year and offer more than exhibition space: in the villa are the Museo Annigoni, the Fondazione Capucci and the Società Toscana di Orticoltura.

T

For information on opening hours and events see:

www.bardinipeyron.it

Bardini Garden via dei Bardi, 1r and costa San Giorgio, 2 open: every day 8.15-16.30 in January, February, November and December; 8.15-17.30 in March; 8.15-18.30 in April, May, September and October; 8.15-19.30 from June to August closed: 1st and last Monday of the month, 1 January, 1 May, 25 December

Capucci Museum see p. 47

Museo Pietro Annigoni

The museum, inaugurated in November 2008, houses more than 6,000 pieces and is thus the world’s largest collection of Annigoni’s work. It is a centre for the study of the artistic culture of the 20th century and it organises temporary exhibitions tied to Annigoni and the period in which he lived and worked, fully engaged with his times, with particular attention paid to themes of great critical importance for art in the 20th century.

Villa Bardini costa San Giorgio, 2 until 1 May open: Tuesday to Sunday 10-18 Opening hours may change for exhibitions

www.museoannigoni.it

Gregorio Sciltian, Bacco all’osteria, 1936. Rome GNAM

exhibition

Novecento sedotto. Il fascino del Seicento tra le due guerre Da Velázquez a Annigoni curated by Anna Mazzanti, Lucia Mannini and Valentina Gensini until 1 May; Tuesday to Sunday 10-18, last entrance at 17

The museum takes on a previously unexplored theme in 20th-century Italian art: that particular interest in the 17th century shown by critics and artists between the 1920s and the 1940s. The works of Caravaggio, landscapes and still lifes, the paintings of the Bolognese, Neapolitan and Spanish schools – particularly Velázquez – and great Baroque decoration fascinated and captivated artists like Primo Conti, Felice Carena, Baccio Maria Bacci, Achille Funi, Cipriano Efisio Oppo, Carlo Socrate, Armando Spadini, Giorgio de Chirico, Pietro Marussig, Francesco Trombadori, Gregorio Sciltian and Antonio Bueno. Even Pietro Annigoni was not immune to the attractions of this period, which was expressed in important early works up until the 1940s. The exhibition is divided into three sections: “Attualità del Seicento negli anni venti”, dedicated to expressions of taste in Florence, Rome and Milan, and to the role of early 20th-century critics and collectors in the revival of 17th-century painting; “Il gusto del Seicento”, an analysis of genres and techniques with emphasis on still lifes and landscapes; and “Da Caravaggio alla realtà moderna”, which explores the interpretations of 17th-century art around the 1940s and shows how fascination for the 17th century also inspired the world of film-making.

events linked to the exhibition Guided tours for individuals Tuesday to Friday at 17, Saturday and Sunday at 10.30, 11.30, 15.30, 16.30 Meet at the ticket office, costa San Giorgio, 2 until all places are taken

Guided tour with the curator 1 April at 12 with Valentina Gensini Trekking in the ‘green’ city Walks in the green areas of the centre of Florence with guides expert in landscape architecture and in botany Itinerary one: Bardini Gardens, Villa Bardini and visit to the exhibition 9 and 23 April at 14.30 Itinerary two: Bardini Gardens, visit to the exhibition and Boboli Gardens 17 April and 1 May at 10 Meet at the entrance to the garden of Villa Bardini in via dei Bardi, 1r

Fridays at Villa Bardini A series of lectures on art, cinema, music, scenography and the contemporary Fridays at 17 with the possibility of a free guided visit to the exhibition at 16 • Maria Alberti, Riflessi barocchi, 8 April at 17 • Michele Dantini, Arte povera, Anacronismo,Transavanguardia e oltre, 22 April at 17 Concerto in villa - Portraits.

A Century of Music organised by the Associazione culturale Nuove Tendenze 15 April at 17.30 visit to the exhibition; at 18.30 Monica Turoni, harp; Daniele Ruggieri, flute; Mario Paladin, viola Children: Arte allo specchio see p. 52 all the activities are free to those who buy a ticket to the museum the same day for information and booking: 055 20066206

Società Toscana di Orticoltura

After the Accademia dei Georgofili this is the oldest Florentine institution in the agricultural sector, founded in 1854 when it aimed to encourage and support improvements in the field of horticulture. Among the tasks of the new Società was the organisation of periodic public exhibitions of flowers, vegetables and fruit. In 1859 the marchese Lorenzo Ginori Lisci gave the Società use of land where it could experiment in the cultivation of exotic plants; it was here that the great glasshouse was built to the plans of the architect Roster, opened in 1880 to house the first Esposizione Nazionale di Orticoltura. Here, in the Giardino dell’Orticoltura, the Società held its most important events until 1931, when the garden was bought by the city of Florence. The Società is still strong and active, demonstrated by its many activities, including the exhibition sales of plants and flowers held in the Giardino dell’Orticoltura. Housed in the Villa Bardini is a library, open to the public.

38

costa San Giorgio, 2 open: Library Tuesday 15-19, Friday 9-13 or by appointment 339 3865233

www.societatoscanaorticultura.it

bardini villa and garden

Restoring the Bardini garden

*Mariachiara Pozzana is an architect who has worked in landscaping and architecture since 1982. She restored the Giardino Bardini from 1998 to 2007, and the garden of Castello di Torre in Pordenone. She took part in planning the gardens of the Venaria Reale palace from 1998 to 2001 and of the promenade gardens of Lodi. She has designed new gardens for Banca CR in the Novoli district of Florence. In 1996 she published Giardini storici. Principi e Tecniche della conservazione, in 2001 Guida ai giardini della Toscana, and in 2008 La guida al paesaggio della Toscana. She has taught at the Universities of Genoa, Pisa, Catania and Versailles. www.mariachiarapozzana.com mariachiara.pozzana@fastwebnet.it

The significance and value of the restoration of a garden are tied to interpreting the complexity of the civilisation that generated the garden. Every garden is an ethical reality, a field of action, a space for social interaction. The guidelines of design have been identified looking back through time to render legible what was no longer visible, using archaeology to reread portions of the garden that had since disappeared, like the dragon’s canal in the English garden and the wall fountain of the Baroque staircase, which time and vegetation had totally erased. Project philosophy is based on the idea that there can be no conservation without innovation: the philological restoration of accoutrements and of the existing parts of the garden, alternating with innovative structuring elements and new plantings. In the new identity of the garden that lives the contemporaneity of past, present and future, particular importance is attributed to collections of plants, which are inserted in the garden to demonstrate the values of gardening in its purest and most current forms.

Mariachiara Pozzana*

Flowering calendar

1 Viburnum (Viburnum spp.)

March-July

2 Spontaneous bulbous plants

3

March-April

3 Roses (Rosa spp.)

3

June-September

4 Judas trees

(Cercis siliquastrum) April-June

5 Fruit trees

5

March-April

6 Dahlias (Dahlia spp.)

June-September

7 Camellias (Camellia spp.)

March

2 4

10

2

9

5

3

6

3

3

8

11

3

7

11

11

1

8

8 Azaleas (Azalea spp.)

April

9 Hydrangeas (Hydrangea spp.)

May-July

10 Wisteria (Wisteria spp.) mid April-mid May

11 Reblooming iris (Iris spp.)

April, June-August, November

Giardino Bardini chronology 1309 the Comune di Firenze has an estimate drawn up of the Mozzi properties where there is mention of a palace “with a large loggia and garden behind the said palace and an adjoining house with garden and lawn, and walled land behind the house”

early 1400s as a result of serious financial problems the Mozzi family is forced to sell off many of their properties situated in Santa Lucia de’ Magnoli, including the family palace

1551-1552 Luigi di Conte di Giovannozzo dei Mozzi again obtains ownership of a part of the family palace and adjoining lands

first half of the 1600s for Giovan Francesco Manadori the architect Gherardo Silvani (1579-1675) builds a villa in a panoramic position on costa San Giorgio

3

3 January 1603 Senator Piero di Luigi di Conte dei Mozzi reunites the property of the palace, purchasing the remaining part from Ersilia, daughter of Count Bernardo Della Gherardesca 1781 Margherita D’Orford leaves to Giulio Mozzi a “house with large garden” stretching as far as the city walls, at the back of Palazzo Mozzi, and Villa Medici at Fiesole

1793 (ante) the so-called Villa Manadora, on the costa San Giorgio, is bought by the Cambiagi family

1814 Giacomo Luigi Le Blanc is the proprietor of Villa Manadora on costa San Giorgio and in this area creates a modern English-style park

July 1839 Pier Giannozzo dei Mozzi buys from Le Blanc the entire western section of the park, that is, the Englishstyle garden with the villino and the Casino

a green walk Palazzo Pitti and Villa Bardini are connected via the Boboli Gardens. There is free access for residents.

9, 17, 23 April and 1 May with guide

1880 the complex is bought by the Silesian princess Wanda Carolath von Beuthen

1913 the antique dealer Stefano Bardini purchases the entire property from Princess Carolath von Beuthen and begins the great work of transforming the property

1922 at the death of Stefano Bardini the property is inherited by his son Ugo

1965 death of Ugo Bardini; the Bardini inheritance is the object of a long bureaucratic and administrative procedure, only recently concluded

January 2000 following an agreement between the Ministero delle Finanze and the Ente Cassa di Risparmio, restoration work begins on the Giardino Bardini

2007 the villa and garden are opened to the public; a single ticket gives access to the Giardino di Boboli and the Giardino Bardini

39

academies and foundations

Accademia dei Georgofili

The Accademia was founded in 1753 with the purpose of contributing to scientific progress in agriculture and to the development of the rural world. Housed in the Torre de’ Pulci since 1932, it has an extraordinary library with over 70,000 volumes ranging from monographs to journals. Permanent and temporary exhibitions bear witness to the wealth of its holdings, unique in the history of agriculture.

Logge degli Uffizi Corti open: Reading rooms Monday to Friday 15-18

www.georgofili.it

“L’infinita ampiezza del mondo dei fiori”.

Flowers and gardens at the Georgofili

While the Accademia dei Georgofili, founded in Florence in 1753, turned a scientific eye to flowers and gardens, considering them as ‘entities’ to study, examine, classify and cultivate (the former), and to promote and tend to (the latter), it is also true that a sense of beauty filters through the studies that these men of science devoted to the subject, at times with a refined aesthetic attention, and not only in iconographic representation. They in fact saw this universe of colours, shapes, fragrances and harmony as a symbol of civilisation, envied by foreigners for its wealth and variety, but neglected and abandoned at home, and therefore worthy of being relaunched and revitalised. “The cultivation of flowers is held in high esteem among a populace that is rich, industrious and moral at the same time; it thus becomes an important object of economic consideration and of the highest interest in civilised society”: with these words, the editorial staff of the ‘Giornale Agrario Toscano’ (a Florentine periodical founded in 1827 through the initiative of Vieusseux and the Georgofili) addressed its readers in 1827 to urge them to resume the age-old care of flowers and gardens, not simply to reclaim a fine tradition, but also considering both of them as possible ‘objects’ of economic and commercial activities. The Accademia dei Georgofili could not but be aware of such an ‘important object’, and opposed those who considered gardens and flowers as “futile” and “superfluous”. With this outlook, it advocated the birth of a Gardening Society in Tuscany (the Società Toscana di Orticoltura) along the model of those already existent in other European countries, less favoured by climate and geographic location. Tuscany indeed enjoyed a privileged situation, which for the Georgofili was yet a further motive to promote the resumption of an old activity with the help of science and technology. In the middle of the 19th century, the long-desired Society was born thanks to 155 subscribers, the “most intelligent and passionate votaries of horticulture” who supported the initiative in the course of the vegetable and flower growing exposition organised at the Crocetta (1852). Moreover, the attention of the Georgofili for “the infinite amplitude of the world of flowers” had already found concrete expression; in 1814 for example, the Accademia had promoted the publication of Giovanni Vittorio Soderini’s manuscript on vegetable gardens and gardens, entrusting one of its members, Ottaviano Targioni Tozzetti, to edit the book and draft the indices. The Georgofili’s constancy was rewarded through the years with numerous reprints of the publication. Prior to this publication, the Accademia had received other studies on the subject of observations of flowers and gardens.

These were scientific observations perhaps born from the pure aesthetic pleasure of their authors who for personal ‘pleasure’ cultivated, for example, a particular species of “Marginated Geranium” – such was the case of Giovanni Fabbroni – and then translated their passion into studies and dissertations.

In Fabbroni’s essay, Sul geranio variegato (1796), his careful botanical description combines with a particular sensitivity capable of even evoking the universe of colours, shapes and fragrances of the splendid geraniums. The dissertation by the Accademia dei Georgofili member Luca Cagnazzi, Descrizione di una rosa mostruosa (1799), posed itself a scientific purpose: to discover the causes of the quirk of nature that had given birth to a rose of such unusual proportions and great beauty, as shown by the watercolour illustration in the treatise. The Georgofili thus studied and observed the world of flowers and gardens, “compendium of the wondrous and varied beauties of the Lord God”, with scientific determination, realising their economic potential and translating their beauty and wealth, gifts that brought Tuscany fortune and envy, thanks precisely to that abundant “and stunning mass of flowers”.

Luciana Bigliazzi and Lucia Bigliazzi

exhibition

L’Unità d’Italia ai Georgofili.

1848-1914 40

31 March-18 May An exhibition organised within the parameters of the Georgofili’s celebrations of the 150 years of national Unity.

The Accademia (initially the Accademia e Compagnia delle Arti del Disegno) was founded in 1563 by Cosimo I de’ Medici under the influence of Giorgio Vasari.

Among the first Accademicians were Michelangelo Buonarroti, Vasari, Bartolomeo Ammannati, Agnolo Bronzino and Francesco da Sangallo. In 1784 it was reformed by Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo who named it the Accademia di Belle Arti and in 1873 it was separated into two distinct branches, the Board of Academicians also known as Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, and the Teaching Institute (Accademia di Belle Arti). Aside from its collection of sculpture, painting, tapestry and furniture, the Accademia has a historic archive of documents, printed books and photographs and a library with circa 6,000 volumes and journals, devoted to Tuscan artistic culture from the 19th century to the present day. via Orsanmichele, 4 open: Monday to Friday 9.30-12.30

www.aadfi.it

Accademia Toscana di Scienze e Lettere “La Colombaria”

“La Colombaria” developed spontaneously from the meetings of a group of Florentine scholars who established the Academy in 1735. Today it houses an archive consisting of manuscripts, incunabula, 16th-century books and letters, and a collection of drawings and prints. The Academy also publishes a journal entitled ‘Studi’ and the ‘Atti e Memorie’ appear annually. The library consists of some 10,000 volumes and includes the Devoto, Ravà, Procissi and Rodolico archives. via Sant’Egidio, 23 open: Monday to Friday 9.30-13.30

www.colombaria.it

Fondazione Longhi

The Fondazione di Studi di Storia dell’Arte Roberto Longhi was established at Villa “Il Tasso” in 1971 following Longhi’s wish that his library, his photo archive, and his art collection “benefit the younger generation”.

The Fondazione Longhi’s books (about 36,000 volumes), photos (70,000 items), and art collection (paintings, drawings, engravings, miniatures, and sculptures), plus vast archives, are at the disposal of scholars and students. The primary objective of the institution is to encourage and further the study of art history while keeping alive Roberto Longhi’s cultural legacy and the methods he devised. via Benedetto Fortini, 30 open: Library Monday to Friday 9.30-13, 14-17.30 by appointment

www.fondazionelonghi.it

Among the manuscripts conserved in the historical archive of the Accademia is the Plantarum Indicarum Icones et Descriptiones in Regione Malabarrica precipue virentium (1677), which contains hundreds of ink drawings and annotations in both the native language and Latin on the botanical species of the old region of Malabar in southwest India. The two-volume manuscript, drawn up by a Portuguese monk resident in the region of Goa, Padre Salvatore dei Carmelitani Scalzi, had reached Italy through the papal nuncio of Innocent XI. In 1694 the work, which has numerous analogies with texts conserved at the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, came into the possession of a member of the “Colombaria”, Antonio Bonaccorsi Perini, who donated it to the Accademia where it was exhibited on 7 September 1757.

In 1820 the enlightened businessman from Geneva Giovan Pietro Vieusseux opened his Gabinetto Scientifico Letterario in Palazzo Buondelmonti. A lending library was added to the Gabinetto reading room in 1822. The Gabinetto, later moved to Palazzo Strozzi, has counted among its ranks figures like Tecchi, Montale, and Bonsanti, who founded the ‘Antologia Vieusseux’. This is still a vital institution in Florence which organises conferences and events, custodian of a rich library, the Historic Archive and the Archivio Contemporaneo “Alessandro Bonsanti” (Palazzo Corsini Suarez, via Maggio, 42).

Palazzo Strozzi, piazza Strozzi open: Library Monday, Wednesday and Friday 9-13.30, Tuesday and Thursday 9-18. Historic Archive Monday, Wednesday and Friday 9-14, Tuesday and Thursday 9-14, 15-18. Archivio Contemporaneo Monday, Tuesday and Friday 9-13, Wednesday and Thursday 9-17.30

www.vieusseux.fi.it

Accademia della Crusca

The Accademia della Crusca was founded in Florence in 1582-1583 by five Florentine men of letters: Giovan Battista Deti, Anton Francesco Grazzini, Bernardo Canigiani, Bernardo Zanchini, Bastiano de’ Rossi. They were joined almost immediately by Lionardo Salviati, who drew up a cultural programme and a system for codification of the Italian language. Spirited meetings, jokingly called ‘cruscate’ (from ‘crusca’, coarse bran as opposed to fine flour), gave the Accademia its name, and it adopted a rich symbolism relating to grain and bread. From the very beginning, the Accademia welcomed Italian and foreign scholars and exponents of various fields of knowledge: besides grammarians and philologists, there were writers and poets, scientists, historians, philosophers, jurists and statesmen. The Accademia’s principal work, the Vocabolario (first edition in 1612), made a decisive contribution to the identification and diffusion of the Italian language and provided an example for the great foreign dictionaries.

Villa medicea di Castello via di Castello, 46

www.accademiadellacrusca.it

The flora of Malabar

Gabinetto Scientifico Letterario Vieusseux

The Florence Lyceum Club

Housed on the first floor of the 16th-century Palazzo Giugni Fraschetti, this is one of the oldest international cultural associations in Florence. The first Lyceum founded in Italy was based on the model of the women’s clubs – women’s clubs, not feminist groups – opened in 1904 by Constance Smedley in London, Paris and Berlin. The Club’s first president was Beatrice Pandolfini (née Corsini) who set out courageously to offer cultural experiences that were noteworthy for being open and innovative. The most pertinent example is the first Italian exhibition of the Impressionists, admired for the first time in Italy at the Florence Lyceum Club in 1910. The cultural programme running until May 2011 hosts a variety of events including lectures, conferences, exhibitions and music appreciation courses, all of which are free. via degli Alfani, 48

www.lyceumclubfirenze.net

academies and foundations

Accademia delle Arti del Disegno

The culture of plants and flowers in the books of the Gabinetto Vieusseux

In the rich libraries of the Gabinetto Vieusseux an important place is occupied by the collections of English books donated by members of the Anglo-Florentine families who lived in Florence: large collections, numbering thousands of books, many of them rare and valuable, testifying to the taste and interests of the English-speaking community, ever attentive to the world of plants, flowers and gardens. It is worth mentioning that the Herbarium was the ‘first’ book of the poetess Emily Dickinson, who from early childhood was attracted by flowers, a constant presence in her poems. “She herself resembled a flower”, said a lady friend. If Dickinson’s Herbarium, conserved at the University of Harvard (the facsimile edition of 2006 can be consulted at our Library), represents an unsurpassable model, almost an emblem of poetry, the books on gardens and flowers coming from the libraries of the Anglo-Florentine community form an extensive documentation of the ‘genre’: dictionaries of flowers and plants, and of botany, gardening and floriculture manuals, and specialised publications, like those of the National Rose Society or the British Iris Society. From the English-speaking world we move on to Eastern Asia with the Library of Fosco Maraini, containing numerous books on ikebana and on the gardens of China and Japan. Also worth mentioning for the collection of travel books from the 18th to the 20th century. Particularly full of illustrations, in which nature plays an important part, are the books relating to travels in Europe; the Centro Romantico of the Gabinetto is proceeding with the digitalization and analysis by subject of the images in order to form a database on the ‘visual record’ of European countries through their travellers, in which the historical process of interpretation of the landscape (natural and artificial) is highlighted thanks to the computerised accessing of every detail of the image. In reference to Tuscany alone, at the present time we are able to identify through more than a thousand images the various green spaces and their peculiarities: from illustrations of the countryside to those dedicated to gardens and parks or to forests like those of La Verna and Camaldoli.

41

natural history and anthropology museums

he Imperial and Royal Museum of Physics and Natural History, was founded in 1775 by Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo of Hapsburg Lorraine to collect together natural artefacts and scientific instruments, previously kept in the Uffizi Gallery. It is commonly called “La Specola”, recalling the Astronomical Observatory which was completed in 1789. The institute now consists of six sections, or museums, located in palazzi throughout the centre of Florence, where items of quite exceptional naturalistic and scientific value are preserved. These include 16th-century herbals, rare 18th-century waxworks, fossilised skeletons of elephants and collections of brightly coloured butterflies, giant crystals of tourmaline, Aztec artefacts, majestic wooden sculptures and even the largest flower in the world.

The museums represent an impressive universe of nature, history, science and art.

T

Administrative offices: via Giorgio La Pira, 4

www.msn.unifi.it

Anthropology and Ethnology

The oldest items come from the Medici Collections and the 18th-century collection of James Cook, while others were collected by researchers and scientists in the 19th and 20th century.

The American Indians, Lapland, Siberia and Indonesia are all represented in separate sections.

The collection of musical instruments is significant. via del Proconsolo, 12

Geology and Palaeontology

This museum exhibits the fossils of vertebrates that have been found in Tuscany over two centuries, illustrating the palaeontological history of the region, its palaeogeography and the progressive stages in the evolution of marine and terrestrial fauna. Among the items displayed is the skeleton of the oldest primate found in Tuscany. via Giorgio La Pira, 4

Mineralogy and Lithology

Collections of minerals, rocks and gems. Not to be missed is the large topaz crystal and an aquamarine weighing almost 1 kilo. Videos and innovative educational multi-media graphics describe and illustrate the museum’s collections. via Giorgio La Pira, 4 Anthropology and Ethnology Geology and Palaentology Mineralogy and Lithology open: from 1 October to 31 May Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday 9-13, Saturday 9-17; from 1 June to 30 September Monday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday 10-13, Saturday 10-18 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

“La Specola”

On the ground floor is the Skeleton Hall where the skulls and complete skeletons of ancient and extinct animals are housed. On the first floor is Galileo’s Tribune, created in 1841. The second floor houses the zoological museum, providing an almost complete panorama of existing animals as well as a large number now extinct or in danger of extinction.

The collection of anatomical waxes includes items of great scientific, and also artistic, interest; these continue to be consulted in the study of anatomy. In the Torrino of the Specola, the new arrangement exhibits important historic and scientific items including many from the Medici collections.

The exhibition of crystals has again been extended (until June 2012). via Romana, 17 open: from 1 October to 31 May Tuesday to Sunday 9.30-16.30; from 1 June to 30 September Tuesday to Sunday 10.30-17.30 Skeleton Room and Observatory admission with reservation and guided tour only 055 2346760 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

There is an online digital archive (in progress) of historic plant collections in the Botany department that can be consulted. www.parlatore.msn.unifi.it

Botany

This is the most important Italian scientific institution for the collection and preservation of plants. The museum houses some exceptional herbals, and artistic and didactic collections which include the still life paintings of Bartolomeo Bimbi and wax models of plants, fruits and mushrooms made in the 18th and 19th century. via Giorgio La Pira, 4 open: admission with reservation and guided tour only 055 2346760

history The “Giardino dei Semplici” is the third oldest botanical garden in the world after those of Pisa and Padua. It was founded on 1 December 1545 by Cosimo I de’ Medici and was intended to be used by students of Medicine as a garden of medicinal plants (at the time called “semplici”). A particularly significant period for the garden was at the beginning of the 18th century, when it came under the care of the Società Botanica Fiorentina and had as its director Pier Antonio Micheli, one of the Society’s founders.

Micheli slowly transformed the botanical garden into a systematic garden, severing that deep-rooted connection which at the time still linked medicine to botany, and made it into an institution of European renown. At the end of the 18th century, when it passed to the Accademia dei Georgofili, the Garden changed drastically and large areas of it were given over to agricultural cultivation. At the beginning of the 19th century, under the direction of Ottaviano Targioni Tozzetti, it reacquired its character as a systematic garden; at the end of the century Teodoro Caruel had built the large glasshouses situated on via Micheli and under his direction the garden was assigned to the Regio Istituto di Studi Superiori Pratici. In the following years the project of reuniting the Istituto Botanico, founded by Filippo Parlatore in the Museum of via Romana, to the Giardino dei Semplici, was completed. In 1905 the operations of moving all the most important botanical institutions (Library and Herbarium) to the premises overlooking the Giardino dei Semplici were finished and the Istituto Botanico and Garden with its adjoining Museo Botanico was formed. In around 1925, under the direction of Giovanni Negri, the high walls surrounding it on the side of via La Pira and via Gino Capponi were demolished to make the garden visible to the public.

the garden today The Orto Botanico is a section of the Museo di Storia Naturale of Florence University. It covers an area of 2.3 hectares and comprises a complex of thematic flowerbeds, walkways, large glasshouses and smaller greenhouses.

The catalogue presently includes 4,450 plants under cultivation. Many installations have been set up recently for didactic and educational purposes, for scientific research and for the conservation of biodiversity. In 2004 the garden was designated a CESFL (Centro per la conservazione ex situ della flora) by the Regione Toscana and carries out this activity in collaboration with the Botanical Gardens of Pisa and Siena.

Since May 2008 multisensorial tactile and olfactory itineraries have been made available for the blind. There are numerous collections in the Orto Botanico, all of them noteworthy, and some truly outstanding. We should point out particularly the collection of cycads, numbering over 200 specimens belonging to 9 genera. Some are magnificent in terms of size and appearance, having been under cultivation from the beginning of the 20th century. The cycads are sometimes regarded as “living fossils”. Having appeared in remote times (their oldest ancestors can be traced back to the Paleozoic Era), they expanded considerably during the Mesozoic Era and have survived to the present day practically unchanged in terms of their fundamental characteristics, formerly found in extinct species. Lastly, we should not fail to mention the old Taxus baccata, planted in 1720 when the illustrious Florentine botanist Pier Antonio Micheli was director of the garden. via Pier Antonio Micheli, 3 open: from 16 October to 31 March, Saturday, Sunday and Monday 10-17; from 1 April to 15 October Monday, Tuesday and Thursday to Sunday 10-19 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

focus

natural history and anthropology museums

Botanical Garden “Giardino dei Semplici”

43

stibbert museum

ow a Foundation, the Stibbert Museum came into being in 1908 on the death of Frederick Stibbert (1838-1906). According to the terms of his will, Stibbert left his art collections and the building where they were housed, located at Montughi, to the city of Florence. The bequest is now a rare example of a 19th-century house and museum which is still well preserved. In recent years, many of the original arrangements and exhibits, altered during the 20th century, have been reinstated. The creation of the Japanese armoury was one of Stibbert’s passions and he went on collecting up until the last months of his life, hundreds of objects that document the styles of armour and the splendid quality of edged weapons from the ‘Land of the Rising Sun’.

Today the collection is considered one of the most important in the western world.

N

via Frederick Stibbert, 26 open: Monday to Wednesday 10-14, Friday to Sunday 10-18 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

www.museostibbert.it

44

The Park of Villa Stibbert

In 1848 Giulia Cafaggi, mother of Frederick Stibbert, bought a villa and garden at Montughi which belonged to the Mezzeri family. Madame Giulia personally attended to the choice of plants and flowers in the garden which had a typical Italian-style layout, as can be seen in a small family painting executed at the time.

Within a few years the property was enlarged through the purchase of a neighbouring villa belonging to the Rossellini family, which the Stibberts decided to convert into a large stables for horses and carriages. At this time Frederick Stibbert had just come back from England, where he had attended college, and he began to manifest both an interest in art and social ambitions. In 1859 the architect Giuseppe Poggi was entrusted with the task of converting the recently purchased villa, creating at the northern boundary of the property a lemonhouse with two adjoining greenhouses, and reorganizing the entire property into a single park. The project, carried out to the specifications of Stibbert or under the inspiration of Poggi, both masons, shows evident esoteric touches in the layout of walkways, in the arrangement of various decorative elements, and above all in the creation of the fantastic neo-Egyptian temple on the shore of the lake, completed by 1864, at the height of the period of ‘Egyptmania’. But the real transformation of the park took place after the middle of the 1870s, when Frederick bought yet another property, Villa Bombicci, this time to the south. This allowed the building to be enlarged and made it possible to allocate a suitable area for the great art collections that Stibbert had accumulated in the first twenty years of his career. Together with the building, which became the present structure some 150 m in length distributed over the ridge of the Montughi hill, the park was also enlarged, reaching a total area of over three hectares. The architect Gerolamo Passeri was then entrusted with the task of levelling the land and with the creation of a large entrance avenue running the entire length of the property, which was transformed into the large romantic park we see today. The vegetation was enriched with new plants and charming new elements were introduced, like the Venetian loggia, today in need of complete restoration, small grottoes and artificial ruins. The park, at the time evocatively illuminated by gaslight, together with the house and the museum, was a splendid expression of the prestige of Frederick Stibbert as a collector and man of success.

Entry to the park of the Stibbert Museum is free. open: Monday to Wednesday and Friday to Sunday until sunset closed: days of museum closure

La scuola del mondo Disegni di Leonardo e Michelangelo a confronto 5 April-25 July The exhibition, resulting from a joint initiative of the Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan and the Fondazione Casa Buonarroti, displays 12 drawings by Leonardo and 12 drawings by Michelangelo in what may be seen as a fascinating prelude to the great exhibition of drawings by Leonardo and Michelangelo that opens in Rome in October at the Musei Capitolini. For the first time the two artists are compared directly, the idea for this coming from various preparatory sketches for the frescoes of the battles of Anghiari and Cascina that were supposed to have been painted in the Sala del Maggior Consiglio of Palazzo Vecchio.

n 1911, the English architect and art historian Herbert Percy Horne purchased Palazzo Corsi in via de’ Benci to house his collection of paintings, sculptures, drawings, and furnishings in such a way as to recreate the atmosphere of a Renaissance home. Horne died in 1916, his collection (which in the meantime had grown to include more than 6,000 works) was left to the Italian State, creating a foundation “for the benefit of study.” Today, visitors see the Horne Museum as the English collector would have wanted them to: an elegant treasure chest of masterpieces of painting and sculpture (from Giotto to Simone Martini, Masaccio, Filippino Lippi, Domenico Beccafumi, and Giambologna), but above all as a home, decorated with precious items dating from the 1200s to the 1600s.

In the heart of Florence, this symbol of the culture and art of the Renaissance is a space in which to relive the past and discover the customs, costumes, and art as they were in 15th- and 16th-century Florence.

I

via dei Benci, 6 open: Monday to Saturday 9-13

www.museohorne.it

uilt by Michelangelo Buonarroti the Younger to celebrate his family’s fame, this fine 17th-century palazzo, is now a house museum with a dual function: to bear witness to the efforts of the Buonarroti through the centuries to expand and embellish their home, to protect the precious cultural legacies it contains (including the valuable Archives and the Library), and to preserve rare art collections; and at the same time, to project celebrate the genius of Michelangelo, by exhibiting many of his works, such as Nel nome the Madonna of the Stairs and the di Michelangelo Battle of the Centaurs, and Itineraries linking the Casa alongside them the extensive Buonarroti and the Santa Croce collection of drawings. The Monumental Complex. The two places museum holds annual exhibitions have an important link in Michelangelo. addressing themes that relate to the This initiative, begun in 2010, also Casa’s cultural and artistic heritage highlights the importance of the and its legacy, as well as to Santa Croce quarter with Michelangelo and his times. cultural and promotional

B

activities via Ghibellina, 70 open: Monday and Wednesday to Sunday 9.30-16 closed: 1 January, Easter, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

www.casabuonarroti.it

he collections grew at the same time as the Doccia ceramics factory founded by Carlo Ginori in 1737. This was the first museum of a manufacturing enterprise founded in Italy and recounts, through its collections, the history of the oldest business producing porcelain still active today in Italy.

T

viale Pratese, 31, Sesto Fiorentino open: Wednesday to Saturday 10-13, 14-18

www.museodidoccia.it

casa buonarroti • horne museum • richard ginori museum

exhibition

45

he Museo Galileo (Galileo Museum) is heir to a prestigious tradition of scientific collecting that boasts nearly five centuries of history and centres on the importance attributed, by the Tuscan grand dukes, to the protagonists and to the tools of science. It revolves around the figure of Galileo Galilei, authoritative and controversial protagonist of astronomy and modern science.

The new arrangement of the museum emphasises the importance of Galileo in the museum’s collections and the research activities that identify the dual function of the Galileo Museum – as an Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza, an institute and a museum for the history of science.

permanent exhibition

galileo mu-

T

first floor: Medici Collection rooms I-IV After an introduction to the Medici collectors, the tour begins with astronomy, exploited by the first Medici who associated their sovereign power with the control of planetary motion. Cosimo I, in particular, by identifying his name with the word kosmos, promoted cosmographic research, celebrating it not only in his own collection but also in his city’s great buildings.

room V Cosimo I and his son Ferdinando I promoted the science of navigation in Tuscany, necessary to the Grand Duchy’s expansionist and commercial ambitions, and reinforced and enlarged the Port of Livorno.

room VI Another crucially important field of application of the sciences was the new military technology that radically transformed the concept of warfare, no longer a chivalric art but a mathematical science. The young Galileo made a brilliant entrance into this field with his first highly acclaimed instrument, the geometric and military compass, presaging the honours bestowed on him by the Medicean court.

piazza dei Giudici, 1 open: Wednesday to Monday 9.30-18, Tuesday 9.30-13 closed: 1 and 6 January, Easter, 1 May, 24 June, 15 August, 1 November, 8 December, 25-26 December

www.museogalileo.it

rooms VII-IX With his invention of the telescope and first astronomical discoveries Galileo left an indelible mark that, in spite of the Church’s condemnation, was consolidated through Medici patronage and the work of his followers.

second floor: Lorraine Collection room X After the decline of the Medici dynasty, the Lorraine government added to and showcased the collection, assigning it a special display area in the Imperiale e Regio Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale (Imperial and Royal Museum of Physics and Natural History), situated in the vicinity of Palazzo Pitti.

rooms XI-XIII

•

In the 18th century, a fashion for spectacular scientific demonstrations swept through the educated classes, favouring the production of new educational instruments illustrating scientific discoveries in the fields of acoustics, thermology, optics, and electricity.

room XIV In Italy, only Giovanni Battista Amici, director of the Florence Astronomical Observatory, was able to make original optical instruments that could compete with great European production.

rooms XV-XVI

museum of mathematics

With the affirmation of the experimental method in the 17th century, new instruments were used to explore the phenomena of nature, to discover the laws that govern them and to disclose realities hitherto hidden to the perception of the senses.

46

room XVII Equally important themes are the Lorraine commitment to the sphere of pharmacological chemistry and the new theoretical and experimental approaches that animated the Europeanwide debate on chemistry.

Museo Galileo, Florence Photo Franca Principe and Sabina Bernacchini

room XVIII The interest of the upper classes in experimental science created a new market for instrument makers who, along with one-of-a-kind pieces made for collectors, introduced a standard series of instrumentation designed for cultural entertainment and self-education in the domestic sphere.

Il Giardino di Archimede A mathematics museum The Giardino di Archimede is a museum, the first of its kind, dedicated entirely to mathematics and its applications.

The museum is organised into a number of interrelated sections, each of which functions as an independent exhibition.

The section “Oltre il compasso”, dedicated to the geometry of curves, is flanked by a second interactive section, “Aiutare la natura: dalle Meccaniche di Galileo alla vita quotidiana”. Galileo started his work on machines and mechanics by underlining the distance between the science of machines which he described and the empiricism bordering on charlatanism of “mechanics” which promised wonders that it was never actually able to produce. Machines, however ingenious and complex, cannot “deceive nature”, they can only guide it and apply its laws in useful works that can easily carry out operations that would otherwise be arduous or even impossible. Machines are used, therefore, not to deceive nature but rather to help it. Thus, there is no need for sophisticated mechanisms and complicated constructions; simple machines are sufficient, based on a few obvious, natural principles, which by their very nature can be described in the universal language of mathematics. In the exhibition it is possible to interact with the machines studied by Galileo and realize that they continue to be used today, thus fully appreciating that the humble instruments we use on a daily basis contributed to the birth of modern science.

Information on the various sections can be found on the website. via San Bartolo a Cintoia, 19/a open: Monday to Friday 9-13, Sunday 15-19 closed: holidays and the whole month of August

www.archimede.ms

Controverses. Una storia giuridica ed etica della fotografia produced by the Musée de l’Elysée of Lausanne 11 March-5 June The approximately 70 photographs on show, from the collection of the Musée de l’Elysée, are photographs of scandals and controversial images that often wind up in court; they illustrate how culture or society sees itself and thus lead us to consider contemporary debates with a critical eye.

he Museo Nazionale Alinari della Fotografia, managed by the Fratelli Alinari Fondazione per la Storia della Fotografia (Alinari Brothers Foundation for the History of Photography), includes a space for temporary exhibitions of historical and contemporary photography and a permanent exhibition space devoted to the history and the techniques of photography. A particular feature of the museum is the Museo Tattile (Tactile Museum) for the blind: for the first time, a museum space devoted to photography includes specially designed braille supports for ‘reading’ the works.

T

Morgante. Nicola Lo Calzo 9 June-31 July

piazza Santa Maria Novella, 14a rosso open: Monday and Thursday 15-19, Tuesday 10-15, Friday to Sunday 10-19 closed: the whole month of August

www.mnaf.it

Morgante, the most famous dwarf of the Medici court in Palazzo Pitti, has always been portrayed as a “monstrum”: from the paintings by Bronzino to the sculptures by Giambologna, dehumanised and stripped of his individuality, the dwarf has gradually become an idea, an archetype through which the ‘family of man’ acknowledges diversity.

Departing from such a literary and iconographic correspondence, Nicola Lo Calzo proposes a previously unpublished gallery of photographic portraits, taken in Central Africa, of individuals suffering from dwarfism, and portrays diversity as a value and self-acceptance.

Nicola Lo Calzo Photographer contact@nicolalocalzo.com

Paris +33 954 30 55 20 / +33 698 67 95 72

Museo Roberto Capucci

Museo Salvatore Ferragamo

The collection of footwear on exhibition at this museum, inaugurated in 1995, documents the entire working life of Salvatore Ferragamo, from his return to Italy in 1927 until his death in 1960.

The museum highlights both the great technical prowess and the artistic flair of a master whose contribution to the brand “Made in Italy” was fundamental, and his relations with the artists of his time. The collection is enhanced by post-1960 production: every year, several contemporary models are given places in the Archivio Salvatore Ferragamo, from which the museum selects the materials for exhibition.

Housed in Villa Bardini, the Capucci Museum opened in 2007 with the aim of making Capucci’s work better known through thematic exhibitions. The rotating exhibitions use the rich archive of the Fondazione which, founded in 1951, includes 450 creations, 300 illustrations, 22,000 sketches, 20 notebooks, 150 audiovisual sources, 50,000 photographs and 50,000 press articles.

new display from February Variations on the theme of creativity: flutings and curls, plissé pleats and geometric lines unravel from the dresssculpture in golden yellow and fuchsia – photographed by Sham Hinchey and Marzia Messina – inspiring the 23 creations on display in the new exhibition that shows a series of studies and variations by artist and inventor of styles Roberto Capucci. A collection of ‘shorts’: geometric, with elaborate curls, interesting experimentation and innovative working of pleated fabric.

piazza Santa Trinita, 5r open: Wednesday to Monday 10-18; in August, Monday to Saturday 10-13 and 14-18 closed: 1 January, 1 May, 15 August, 25 December

costa San Giorgio, 2 open: Tuesday to Sunday 10-18 closed: 1 January, 25 December

www.museoferragamo.it

www.fondazionerobertocapucci.com

Nicola Lo Calzo, Serge, Dealer, 30 years old, Douala, from the series ‘Morgante’, courtesy School Gallery Paris

Textiles Museum of Prato

The museum was created in 1975 within the Istituto Tecnico Industriale Tessile Tullio Buzzi, as a cultural institution aimed at conserving the memory of local industrial production and acting as material information support in from the museum the study of Works of extension and renovation in industrial progress textile The museum remains closed to the public in the spring design. and summer period.

For further information consult the museum website.

via Santa Chiara, 24, Prato

www.museodeltessuto.it

alinari national museum of photography • fashion museums and archives

exhibitions

47

fiesole museums

Civic Archaeological Museum

The museum exhibits early Etruscan, Roman and medieval artefacts which came to light during excavations in the area of Fiesole, as well as items donated by private collectors. As it began to grow in size, in 1914 the museum was transferred to a structure in the shape of an Ionic temple, designed by Ezio Cerpi and located inside the archaeological park. Reorganised in 1981, this also houses the Costantini Collection. via Portigiani, 1, Fiesole open: every day, March and October 10-18, from April to September 10-19, from November to February 10-14 closed: Tuesday from November to February

photo Francesca Anichini

www.museidifiesole.it

48

Museo Bandini

Founded by Canon Angelo Maria Bandini in 1795, the Museo Bandini was first housed in the church of Sant’Ansano. On his death the Canon left the museum to the Chapter of Fiesole. Not to be missed on the ground floor are some fine Della Robbia terracottas (including the Effigy of a Young Man, known as Sant’Ansano by Andrea della Robbia) as well as some fragments of classical sculptures, inlaid furniture and marble basrelief sculptures. Displayed in the two rooms on the first floor are paintings by well-known artists (from Taddeo Gaddi to Nardo di Cione and Lorenzo Monaco) in addition to works dating from the 13th to the 17th century. via Giovanni Dupré, 1, Fiesole open: every day, March and October 10-18, from April to September 10-19, from November to February 10-14 closed: Tuesday from November to February

www.museidifiesole.it

The Primo Conti Foundation is housed in the 15th-century Villa Le Coste where the artist lived for many years. In 1980 the villa became the seat of the Foundation when a donation by the Conti family led to the establishment of a Documentation and Research Centre for the History of Avant-Garde Movements. The Foundation has three sections: the Museum with the works of Primo Conti, the Archive and the Studio. The Museum (with 63 paintings and 163 drawings by the artist) and the Archive (housing many archives including those of Papini, Conti, Pavolini, Carocci, Pea, Samminiatelli) together represent a unique resource in Italy for the scholarly study and understanding of avant-garde movements. via Giovanni Dupré, 18, Fiesole open: Museum Monday to Friday 9-13.

Visits also on Saturday, Sunday and the afternoon, for groups by appointment Archive Monday to Friday 9-13, by prior appointment

www.fondazioneprimoconti.org

Fiesole Espone 2011

fiesole museums

Primo Conti Foundation

The name of Fiesole is indissolubly linked to history and culture.

This was the idea behind the organization, at a difficult time for museums and culture in general, of a dense programme of exhibitions. The shows, being held in the four most important places of the town, each touch on a different and at the same time very ‘Fiesolean’ theme...

Paolo Becattini

Assessore alla Cultura del Comune di Fiesole

Sirio Midollini.

Disegni e Pittura organised by the Sirio Midollini Archive Sala del Basolato, piazza Mino 5-30 March The Florentine artist Sirio Midollini, an exponent of Neorealism, was one of the founders of ‘Nuova Corrente’. His painting, progressively more sensitive to formal requirements, is based on the expressive force of blocks of coloured surface and clearly marked lines.

Gli Etruschi e il Sacro.

Da Fiesole a Sovana curated by Marco De Marco Civic Archaeological Museum 2 April-29 May An exhibition on the role of the Academies in the formation of the Tuscan archaeological museums that exhibits the finds discovered in excavations carried out by “La Colombaria” and donated to the museums of Fiesole and Sorano.

Antonio Manzi custode di attimi curated by Stefano De Rosa Basilica di Sant’Alessandro

exhibitions

Antonio Crivelli.

Il Verso del Tempo

Archaeological area and piazza Mino June-August

The sculptures of Crivelli harmonize perfectly in the archaeological area, creating a bisector between past and future. The metaphorical works, the archaeological remains and the ancient art, all present in the same context, are the watermark through which to reflect on man’s infinite struggle to give body to the invisible.

Giovanni Michelucci.

Disegni inediti

organised by the Fondazione Michelucci Civic Archaeological Museum 15 September-30 October

Following the exhibition on F.L.Wright, the celebration of the masters of architecture by the Comune di Fiesole continues with the initiative “Le Città di Michelucci”. The exhibition of about 40 unpublished drawings is an original contribution to the knowledge of his research methods in confronting architectural challenges and of his energy in graphically describing imagined spatiality.

9 April-30 May The exhibition, organised in association with the Comune di Campi Bisenzio, for the first time puts on display large-scale works by Manzi, in particular the monumental ceramics, with which he modified his concept of sculpture and decoration.

Isole del pensiero. Böcklin, de Chirico, Nunziante curated by Giovanni Faccenda Sala del Basolato, piazza Mino 16 April-5 June The present exhibition, 110 years after the death of Arnold Böcklin (18271901), identifies an expressive line of continuity over more than a century: 5 of his works from Villa Bellagio, his last residence, 5 by Giorgio de Chirico and 15 paintings by Antonio Nunziante, the Italian painter who came closest to the values of beauty and mystery that were hallmarks of the artist from Basle.

‘FIESOLE ESPONE’ 2011 with the support of

via del Salviatino, 21, Firenze Tel. +39 055 9041111 Fax +39 055 9041247 http://salviatino.com

49

foreigners in florence

New York University in Florence at Villa La Pietra

Villa La Pietra is the seat of New York University in Florence. The Villa houses the Acton collection with over 7,000 paintings, sculptures and other objects, and a library with about 12,000 volumes and 16,000 photographs. The university hosts the Remarque Institute seminars, the Graduate Studies seminars, the Acton Miscellany, the Season Events and the La Pietra Policy Dialogues. via Bolognese, 120

www.nyu.edu/global/lapietra/

history built in the 15th century for the Macinghi family, bought and partly transformed by the banker Francesco Sassetti in 1460, bought by the Capponi family in 1491. The villa and its gardens were bought by the Actons in 1908 and left by Sir Harold Acton to New York University in 1994 the garden the gardens had been landscaped in the English style in the 19th century and the Actons set about recreating gardens in the original Italian style. The garden is laid out on three stepped terraces with architectural and decorative elements. Many of the statues bought

by Arthur Acton to decorate the garden, by Orazio Marinali and Antonio Bonazza, came from the villas along the Brenta river in the Veneto area access tours of the gardens take place on Tuesday mornings.

Advance reservation required, villa.lapietra@nyu.edu 055 5007210

New York University La Pietra Policy Dialogues aims to make a creative contribution to contemporary public policy debate by bringing together a wide array of actors not commonly called upon to reflect on policy questions or to sit at the same table together, including academics, politicians, business leaders, and other public intellectuals, with the ultimate goal of building a rich and diverse network across the Atlantic.

lapietra.policy.dialogues@nyu.edu www.nyu.edu/global/lapietra/policy.dialogues

spring events The RePRESENTATIONS: Contemporary Identities in Motion Photography Exhibition and Lecture Series explore issues surrounding the presentation and re-presentation of ‘selves’ and ‘others’ and their particular histories in the public square in increasingly multicultural societies on both sides of the Atlantic. until 22 April Africa: See You, See Me photography exhibition organised in partnership with New York University Africana Studies and Fondazione Studio Marangoni 21 March Third Annual Transatlantic Dialogue on Immigration: Islam and Integration in the City Conference on the complex place of Islam in European and American societies and how recent mosque-building controversies constellate underlying tensions 2 May Complicated Ties: Stories and Histories of Italy and East Africa Historians and creative writers from Somalia, Eritrea and Ethiopia discuss Italian colonialism and its legacies in the conference, one of the few occasions when experts in Italian colonial history share a platform with a new generation of writers from those former colonies.

The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies

The centre at Villa I Tatti is devoted to advanced study of the Italian Renaissance in all its aspects: the history of art; political, economic, and social history; the history of science, philosophy, and religion; and the history of literature and music.

Villa I Tatti via di Vincigliata, 26

edited by Alyson Price

www.itatti.it

50

history the villa was built over an existing ancient building dating back to the 11th century and after changing hands several times fell into disrepair. In 1906 it was bought by the art historian Bernard Berenson. In 1909 Berenson commissioned the English landscape architect Cecil Pinsent and the English architect Geoffrey Scott to transform the house and garden into a Renaissance-style villa set in a formal garden. Berenson bequeathed I Tatti to Harvard University and it is now a centre for Italian Renaissance studies the garden beyond the limonaia is a series of terraced gardens, lined by cypress trees, that run down over the slope facing south. The terraces are divided up into geometric flowerbeds bordered by box hedges. Behind the villa is a hanging garden. The tree-lined avenues lead into open countryside ensuring the garden blends beautifully with its surroundings access visits take place on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons at 15 and are by appointment, info@itatti.it 055 603251

Villa La Pietra drawing from J.C. Sheperd, G.A. Jellicoe, Italian Gardens of the Renaissance, London 1924, reprinted New York 1993.

Georgetown University

In 1979, Margaret Rockefeller Strong Cuevas, granddaughter of John D. Rockefeller, donated her father’s estate, Villa Le Balze, to Georgetown University. Her aim was that Le Balze would be a place of learning in honour of her father, himself a philosopher, writer, and educator.

Georgetown University now offers students the opportunity to study in Florence, and organises conferences and publications.

Villa Le Balze via Vecchia Fiesolana, 26

www11.georgetown.edu history the villa, which stands on a particularly narrow site, was designed in 1911 by Cecil Pinsent for the American Charles Augustus Strong. In 1979 Strong’s daughter bequeathed the villa to Georgetown University the garden the garden is in the form of a series of green spaces, enclosed by walls. These spaces include the ‘orange-tree garden’ and the ‘winter garden’, fountains and grottoes. The gardens end in a copse of holm oaks.

The landscaping is perhaps the best example of Pinsent’s skill in allowing an organised architectural space to gradually give way to the natural surroundings of meadows and olive groves access visits by appointment only, info@villalebalze.org 055 599548

The EUI is an international postgraduate teaching and research institute established in 1972 by the six founding Member States of the European Community to promote cultural and scientific development in the social sciences, law and humanities in a European perspective. Lectures and seminars are organised with high profile figures on the international scene.

The EUI carries out its work in various places near the city.

Badia Fiesolana via dei Roccettini, 9, San Domenico di Fiesole

www.eui.eu Villa Salviati via Salviati, 5 history in 1445 Alamanno Salviati had a 14thcentury castle on the site transformed into a villa with a garden and wood. In 1490 the villa went to his nephew Jacopo who was married to Lorenzo de’ Medici’s daughter Lucrezia. After changing hands many times the villa now belongs to the Italian State and since 2009 has been the seat of the Historical Archives of the European Union the garden the Italian garden, in front of the villa, consists of three terraces on different levels. The property is contained in a vast English park with a bamboo wood, two lakes, statues, temples, grottoes, pavilions and fountains access renovation work is currently taking place and the villa and gardens are inaccessible

Villa Schifanoia via Boccaccio, 121 history the villa was built over the remains of the ancient Villa Palmieri. The main core of the villa belonged to the Cresci family until 1550. It has changed hands many times and seen many alterations and additions, such as the family chapel built in the 19th century. In 1927 the villa became the property of Myron Taylor, the US Ambassador to the Vatican. The villa was bought by the Italian State in 1986 and is now one of the sites of the European University Institute the garden the Italian-style garden was laid out in Taylor’s time. It is divided into three parterres with box hedges and arranged around a series of small fountains. The garden is enlivened with statues, marble sundials and other stone decorations, as well as small pools and fountains access visits by appointment only, huguette.gonnelli@eui.eu 055 4685388

Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz

Founded in 1897, and part of the MaxPlanck-Gesellschaft since 2002, this is one of the oldest research institutions dedicated to the history of art and architecture in Italy. One of its principle aims is the education of scholars of an international level. The Institute’s resources include the library with over 300,000 volumes, 940 ongoing journal subscriptions, and one of the most wideranging photographic libraries on Italian art, at the disposal of researchers from all over the world. via Giuseppe Giusti, 44

www.khi.fi.it

international conference Immagini e parole in esilio. Avignone e l’Italia alla prima metà del XIV secolo (1310-1352 ca.) organised by Elisa Brilli, Laura Fenelli and Gerhard Wolf Florence-Avignon 7-11 April Leonardo da Vinci and Optics organised by Francesca Fiorani and Alessandro Nova 26-28 May Aesthetics and Techniques of Lines between Drawing and Writing organised by Gerhard Wolf and Marzia Faietti 30 June-2 July

British Institute of Florence The Harold Acton Library

Founded in 1917 to promote cultural exchange between Italy and the Englishspeaking world, the British Institute today offers a comprehensive programme of courses in the Italian language, the English language and history of art, as well as a wide range of cultural events.

The extensive library is open to the public by subscription.

foreigners in florence

European University Institute

French Institute in Florence

The French Institute, the oldest in the world and established in 1907, is part of the French State and of the cultural network of the French Embassy in Italy. It is located in the 15th-century Palazzo Lenzi and for over a century it has constantly maintained an active cultural policy and developed its unique library and newspaper library. piazza Ognissanti, 2

www.france-italia.it

events cinema Jeudi Cinéma Films in their original language on Thursdays at 20 until 5 May music 1-3 April Masterclass, Christophe Rousset 12-13 April Masterclass, Tristan Murai c/o Scuola di Musica di Fiesole 17 April Les Talens Lyriques c/o Teatro della Pergola Suona francese. Musica attuale / Festival Fabbrica Europa 7 May Les Trois Baudets 13-14 May La Zampa: Requiem c/o Stazione Leopolda 15 May European Joystick Orchestras 9 June Jeanne Cherhal and la Grande Sophie

Dutch University Institute for Art History

Founded in 1958 to encourage cultural exchange, particularly between northern and southern Europe, the Dutch Institute for the History of Art has an extensive and specialised library with a prestigious collection of critical texts on the history of art and culture. The main areas of specialization are Italian art and the art of the Netherlands.

lungarno Guicciardini, 9

viale Torricelli, 5

www.britishinstitute.it

www.iuoart.org

event

event

Festival of Europe 6-10 May A series of events, strengthening the links between Florence and European institutions, transform the city into a creative workshop to raise awareness of the European Union among the city’s inhabitants. Among the events are a conference on the state of the European Union (on EU institutional issues and on the euro), and a series of seminars, exhibitions, educational and cultural activities, concerts, performances and competitions organised in various Florentine spaces and piazze.

Shakespeare Week 11-14 April A series of events around the play Twelfth Night, or What You Will. These include readings, lectures, films and music. On 14 April doctoral students from universities all over Italy participate in the Shakespeare Graduate Conference.

international conference From Pattern to Nature in Italian Renaissance Drawing. The transition from pattern book drawings to life drawing (from Pisanello to Leonardo) organised by Michael W. Kwakkelstein and Lorenza Melli 6-7 May

Andrej Tarkovskij International Institute

The Russian director had wanted to run an international academy of arts in Florence, where he chose to live. After his death in 1992 the Istituto opened with the aim of making Tarkovskij’s work better known in Italy. The institute organises retrospectives, conferences, initiatives and concerts. Tarkovskij’s archive, including his photographs, is collected in Florence under the wing of the Italian State and is in the process of being catalogued. info@tarkovskij.com

51

Activities generally take place in Italian, please consult websites for information regarding activities in English or in other languages.

Arte allo specchio

(Art in the mirror)

at the Museo Annigoni Villa Bardini

workshops for children aged 7 to 12 until 1 May Sundays at 16 guided visit for parents at 16.30 bookings 055 20066206 mg.geri@bardinipeyron.it www.museoannigoni.it

april

may

Famiglie al museo

Musesplorando

Museo di San Marco

Museo di Storia Naturale

10 April at 9.30 and 11 16 April at 9.30 and 15.30

on the occasion of European Museum Night 14 May from 20 to 01

Il racconto della Pasqua nei dipinti del Beato Angelico

Arte allo specchio Museo Annigoni every Sunday at 16

Musesplorando Sezione Antropologia e Etnologia

A caccia dello Strumento (Progetto Anno delle Foreste) 3 April at 10.30-12.30

Sezione Zoologia “La Specola”

Insetti: un mondo di biodiversità 10 April at 10.30-12.30

OvoMuseo 23 April at 10.30-12.30 and 14.30-16.30

Night-time opening

Sezione Zoologia “La Specola”

Insetti: un mondo di suoni e colori 8 May at 10.30-12.30

Canta e saprò chi sei 22 May at 10.30-12.30 Sezione Geologia e Paleontologia

Piccini Piccini

15 May at 10.30-12.30

Domeniche matematiche Museo della Matematica

Amico Museo

guided visit and workshop 8 May at 16

Sezione Orto Botanico

Oblate e dintorni

(Oblate and round about)

at the Oblate complex activities for adults and children calendar and information 055 291923 oblatedintorni@gmail.com www.oblatedintorni.it

GiocaAlbero

17 April at 10.30-12.30

Domeniche matematiche Museo della Matematica

Origami di Pasqua

guided visit and workshop 3 April at 15.30

Oblate e dintorni in the city

Una caccia al tesoro in città guided visits to the Oblate; discovering Florence last week in April Accademia “La Colombaria”

Piccoli erboristi in Colombaria workshop 30 April at 10-12

Workshops Museo Richard Ginori

Fiera di Primavera

children

activities on the occasion of the Fiera 9-10 April

52

Domeniche matematiche

(Mathematical Sundays)

at the Museum of Mathematics Guided tours and surprises! until May first Sunday of every month the activities are repeated on the following Sundays, depending upon demand reservation required 055 7879594 www.archimede.ms

july

Musesplorando

Musesplorando

around Florence leaving from “La Specola”

A caccia di Piante

Birdwatching in Città 5 June at 10.30-12.30

august Musesplorando

Sezione Orto Botanico

Apriti sera

5 and 21 July at 21-24

Sezione Zoologia “La Specola” 18 August at 21-23.30

Miti dalle piante 14 and 26 July at 21-24

Sezione Geologia e Paleontologia 23 August at 21-23.30

Familiarizzare il Museo Sezione Mineralogia e Litologia

Sezione Mineralogia e Litologia 25 August at 21-23.30

L’arcobaleno della natura 12 June at 10.30-12.30

Sezione Antropologia e Etnologia 30 August at 21-23.30

Sezione Zoologia “La Specola”

children

june

Musesplorando

In fondo al mar...

19 June at 10.30-12.30

is the virtual space where you will find all the educational options open to you for an exciting and curious journey in the world of the sciences. Science at the click of a mouse!

Familiarizzare il Museo

(Getting to know the museum) at the Museo di Storia Naturale

Famiglie al museo

offers workshops, games, guided tours for the old and the young to understand the world of nature through play and experiment in the museum’s collections. bookings 055 2346760 www.musesplorando.it

(Families in the museum) Sezione Didattica del Polo Museale for families with children aged 8 to 13 Big and small children find out about the treasures of art and of history through thematic tours in Florentine museums. New this year: the participation of the Florence State Archive with an itinerary using medieval and Renaissance documents selected for families booking necessary 055 284272 fax 055 2388680 Wednesday at 15-18 and Thursday at 9-12 www.polomuseale.firenze.it/didattica

Laboratori (Workshops)

at the Museo Richard Ginori

activities and workshops for families with children information and bookings 055 4207767 museo@richardginori1735 www.museodidoccia.it

illustrations by Silvia Cheli

53

Families

at Palazzo Strozzi for families with children aged 3 years and up A rich programme of exciting opportunities to discover and explore art while having fun with appropriate activities for kids aged 3 and up. The programme includes the kit for families, thematic visits to exhibitions, workshops, storytelling, art courses for children, and much more.

Il colore dei pensieri

(The colour of thoughts)

What are the colours of our thoughts and emotions? Family visits to the Picasso, Miró, Dalí exhibition and workshop Saturday 10.30-12 for children aged 3 to 6 and accompanying adults Sunday 10.30-12.30 for children aged 7 to 12 and accompanying adults

Osservo, Scopro, Creo (Look, discover, create)

Interactive visits with games and activities to discover the extraordinary Renaissance palace built by Filippo Strozzi first Sunday of the month 16-17 for children aged 5 to 10 and accompanying adults

Il cantastorie

(The storyteller) (The colour of thoughts)

Creative activity at the Picasso, Miró, Dalí exhibition The works of art on show become the opportunity to tell fables, myths and legends. This is where the storyteller steps in, meeting us each time in front of a different work of art to hear a story, observe the painting and draw first Thursday of the month 17.30-18.30 for children aged 5 to 10 and accompanying adults

Come sarò da grande, com’ero da piccolo

A creative writing workshop with exciting narrative games for families: children imagine themselves adults, in words, writing and drawing, while their parents recall how they were as children and how they imagined they would be when grown. The workshop includes a short visit to the exhibition from 26 March to 21 May Saturday afternoons 15-18 children aged 7 to 12 and their parents from 12 March to 17 July during the exhibition Picasso, Miró, Dalí booking required for all activities 055 2469600 prenotazioni@cscsigma.it calendar and information: www.palazzostrozzi.org

Art weekend

at the CCCStrozzina for children aged 6 to 12 and accompanying adults

Workshops and creative activities for children and adults together to discover the world of contemporary art.

children

from March to July

54

every first weekend of the month Saturday 15.30-17.30, Sunday 10.30-12.30 booking required 055 2776461 www.strozzina.org

Workshops at the Pecci

workshops and guided visits for adults and children for the exhibition LIVE from 23 May workshops introducing the language of the image to children aged 6 to 12 summertime bookings 0574 531835 edu@centropecci.it calendar and further information: www.centropecci.it

Workshops

at the Horne Museum The Education Service offers families workshops and visits to the collection information and booking 055 244661 info@museohorne.it www.museohorne.it

illustrazioni di Silvia Cheli

children

L’arte dell’“imparar facendo”

(Learning by doing) at the Museo degli Innocenti age: from 3 to 11 A world of games and creative workshops where children, as in a Renaissance workshop, learn by doing. There are two programmes: Gioca e impara con l’arte (play and learn through art), with a museum visit and direct observation of work followed by practical activities in which children become artists; and Diritti in gioco (rights in play), concentrating on the rights of the child.

Among the workshops are: • Il putto in fasce (the swaddled putto) in search of places and works in the Institute that represent childhood, through a pictorial narrative of the lives of children in other times • Guarda che faccia! (look at that face!) presents Domenico Ghirlandaio and his history as a recorder of the Florence of the late 1400s, to stimulate children to develop their own self-portraits • Gli animali nella storia dell’arte (animals in the history of art) stories, anecdotes and symbols in art and the animal world to stimulate discovery of the symbolism of animals in art and the origins of fantastic creatures. bookings 055 2478386 bottega@istitutodeglinnocenti.it www.labottegadeiragazzi.it

La Bottega dei Ragazzi

(Children’s workshop) Guided games in the nursery.

Spaces are also made available for birthday parties.

Birthdays

at the Museo e Istituto Fiorentino di Preistoria

Celebrate a birthday in the museum and get to know prehistory better. A guide takes the children around some of the cases and allows them to touch some of the objects. At the end of the visit children join in the chosen workshop among the many offered by the museum. The museum also organises treasure hunts designed for different age groups (ages 5 to 12). booking 055 295159 info@museofiorentinopreistoria.it

Detective dell’Arte

Monday to Friday 9-13 and 16-19, Saturday 10-13 and 16-19, Last Sunday of the month 10-13

at the Museo Casa Siviero for children and young people learning from the detective Rodolfo Siviero first weekend in May

on the occasion of ‘Amico Museo’

from May to July

first Saturday of the month www.museocasasiviero.it

Birthdays

Il Museo dei Ragazzi

at Palazzo Vecchio

A collection of educational projects promoted by the municipality, offering a broad array of educational and cultural opportunities, with the participation of various museums. Over 40 activities, using drama, multimedia and hands-on interactive material.

Celebrate a birthday in the evocative surroundings of the Palazzo Vecchio through the Children’s Museum.

Celebrate with gifts and candles in a specially appointed room.

Maximum numbers 20 children and 5 adults.

(Children’s Museum)

activities in the Museo dei Ragazzi

in Palazzo Vecchio Quartieri Monumentali

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 14.30-17.30; Saturday and Sunday 9.30-12.30 and 14.30-17.30.

Activities for children begin at 10 and at 15.

Parents have the first half an hour to decorate the birthday room.

•Scopri Palazzo Vecchio •Favole per i più piccoli •Teatro al museo •Atelier d’arte •Il cibo come cultura •Geografia al museo •Giochi di ruolo

Activities last about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

The Museo dei Ragazzi has different activities going on over the same day, it is therefore possible to choose more than one activity for children. information and bookings 055 2768224 fax 055 2768558 Monday to Sunday 9.30-17 info.museoragazzi@comune.fi.it www.palazzovecchio-museoragazzi.it

55

Eleonora Negri*

The figure of the musician-magician who possesses the key to the secrets of the cosmos, and employs his art and science to intervene on the reality that surrounds him, finds its archetype in the myth of Orpheus. Capable of dominating physical nature as well as the otherworld with his song and the sound of his lyre, Orpheus subdues both animate and inanimate beings, ferocious beasts and divinities of Hades, compelling the latter to allow him what had been granted to no other man: to enter and exit the world of the dead, as a living man, to reclaim his beloved Eurydice. Son of Apollo and the Muse Clio, Orpheus is the initiate who goes in search of the truth that lies prisoner of the inaccessible abyss. The power to cross from life to death in the myth of Orpheus, and then again to life, recalls the story of Christ. In the Renaissance era, Orpheus’ lyre (like David’s cithara) was frequently the musical symbol of the Cross, as well as the metaphor of the power music possesses to touch man in his initiatory journey of descent and ascent, which associates Orpheus with Music.

The magical and therapeutic power of music was well known to the Neoplatonists who sang orphic hymns to the sun, invoking its beneficial effects on the intellect and soul of the members of Marsilio Ficino’s Academy. The relationships between musical notes and numbers, established by the Pythagoreans and acknowledged by the Neoplatonists, gave rise to a magical and mystical symbolism that was very important in Renaissance alchemy. Explicit or implicit musical emblems emerged to reference the cosmological-musical concept of harmonia mundi, evoking the correspondence between man and the cosmos, and the reciprocal influences each exercises on the other, in a language of magical “signs” capable of assuring passage from the human world to the heavenly world. Here, music and song (carmina) are powerful tools of human persuasion over the universe, because they possess the same nature that the harmony of the world is made of. Many works of art inspired by Ficino’s Neoplatonism felt the influence of this desire to intervene in the magical forces of the world. They can be considered veritable “talismans” alluding to a hidden musical meaning: material objects that could receive and hold the spirit of a star and reproduce celestial images, so as to attract the benign influences of planets like the Sun, Jupiter, Venus and Mercury, at the same time seeking to ward off those of Saturn and Mars. These works were allegedly created not so much for the purpose of arousing admiration, as they were to be meditated upon, becoming the object of inner reflection. It appears that Botticelli’s Primavera was a product of this genre, formulated to offer the spirit an image of the world that could reward the contemplator with healthy, life-giving influences to contrast saturnine melancholy. The painting seems to focus on the Venus-Mercury constellation, which is particularly auspicious because it symbolises the most perfect form of Aphrodite, characterised by the conjunction of the soul and the mind.1 In the painting, Venus appears between the Graces and Flora, indicating her spiritual and sensual manifestations proper also to Apollo. In the woodcut that serves as frontispiece to Gaffurius’ Practica musicae (1496) the system of musical intervals depicted in the musical universe associates the note D with Apollo (who drives the chariot of the Sun), with the Dorian mode, and the muse Melpomene: this note is situated in the middle of the cosmic scale, with three notes below it and four above. The highest of these, however, transcends the music of planets, and belongs to the sky of the fixed stars.2 The division of the octave that derives from this woodcut, with the fourth note in the middle and the six remaining grouped into two symmetrical triads, is very close to the arrangement of the figures in the Primavera. A musical allusion would therefore seem implicit in the painting, whose eight figures could represent an entire octave in the tonality of Venus (based on the note C); modulating to the nearby Apollonian tonality, the eighth note of the scale thus obtained would belong to the sphere governed by the muse Urania (often depicted gazing upward, in the same pose as Mercury in the Primavera, on the far left of the composition, in the act of dispersing the clouds with his caduceus). Moreover, Gaffurius compared the low A, the first and lowest note of the scale (belonging to the sphere of the sky of the Moon, governed by Clio) to the “sigh of Proserpina” that breaks the silence of the earth: considering that on her return in spring, Proserpina was traditionally portrayed in the act of scattering flowers, it appears plausible that Botticelli’s talismanic painting intended to evoke an echo of that myth or of its musical equivalent.

What music, in this city!

At a particularly difficult time for culture – and for music in particular – live musical performances are becoming increasingly the kind of species threatened with extinction. In the coming months the city’s most important theatre is hosting the 74th Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, with a series of absolutely unmissable events, like Aida conducted by Zubin Mehta and directed by Ferzan Ozpetek (28 April-12 May), the Coronation of Poppea staged by Pier Luigi Pizzi and directed by Alan Curtis (18-22 June); memorable concerts for adults and children, from the acclaimed partnership Mehta-Barenboim (29-30 April) and Wayne Marshall (28-29 September), to Peter and the Wolf with Florentine mayor Matteo Renzi as the narrating voice (14 May). At a time of crucial transition in the life of this institution, and in the cultural history of our country, the participation of the public in the activities of the theatre and the city’s sense of identification with the Foundation of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino are at the very basis of the support that anyone who has been moved by a musical performance may feel he can offer the institution, thus ensuring the continuation of those emotions to those who succeed us. Other noteworthy events regard the ORT-Orchestra della Toscana, with the evening of Chopin for pianoforte and orchestra (Julian Kovatchev, dir.; Pietro De Maria, pf.; 1 April); the Easter concert with Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (Isaac Karabtchevsky, dir.; 20 April); the astonishing voice of Romina Basso in De Falla’s Siete canciones populares españolas transcribed by Berio (19 May); the Amici della Musica for the meeting-concert with the prodigious Bach of Angela Hewitt (16 April); the Lyceum (Palazzo Giugni, Via degli Alfani, 48) with the guitar “senza confini” of Ganesh Del Vescovo (11 April); the reinterpretation of the music of Piero Piccioni, from jazz to film music, with a fantastic pool of Italian jazz musicians (2 May) and the tribute to Liszt by Riccardo Sandiford (9 May); at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole the “open lesson” of the prodigious cellist Enrico Dindo (17 May) and the intoxicating Festa della Musica (24 June); the projection of Verdi’s Macbeth at the Fulgor cinema live from the Royal Opera House in London (13 June).

1) Frances A. Yates, The hermetic Tradition in Renaissance Science, in Art, Science and History in the Renaissance, Baltimore 1967; Giordano Bruno e la tradizione ermetica, Bari 1969.

2) Edgar Wind, Misteri pagani del Rinascimento, Milano 1971.

*Eleonora Negri pursues an active career in the field of music and musicology. She is a researcher and teacher of music history courses, the author of published articles, a radio presenter and organiser of conferences and concert events. Since 2003 she has worked at the University of Florence, teaching the Epistemology of Music, collaborating on the Degree Course in Philosophy and coordinating music laboratory activities.

Franchino Gaffurio, Practica musicae, 1496

music in the city 56

Botticelli’s Primavera: a musical talisman?

Florentia. La colonia romana nei primi secoli dell’era volgare aveva raggiunto lo splendore del XIII secolo, di Andrea M. Andrenelli, Firenze 2010.

Forme di antropologia. Il Museo Nazionale di antropologia ed etnologia di Firenze, di Emanuela Rossi, Firenze 2011.

Miti di città, a cura di Maurizio Bettini, Maurizio Boldrini, Omar Calabrese e Gabriella Piccinni, Siena 2010.

Architecture, Villas and Gardens Boboli, il giardino alchemico, di Costanza Riva, Chianciano Terme 2010.

Bronzino rivelato. Segreti di tre capolavori, a cura di James M. Bradburne, Firenze 2010.

Brunelleschi e la sua cupola, di Carlo Caputo, Modena 2010.

Carteggi e disegni di Macchiaioli. La raccolta Fedi della Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Firenze, direzione del progetto scientifico Gabriella Condemi, testi a cura di Cristina Palma, Livorno 2010.

Dessins italiens du musée du Louvre.

Baccio Bandinelli, 1493-1560, di Françoise Viatte, Milano 2011.

Firenze Milleseicentoquaranta. Arti, lettere, musica, scienza, a cura di Alessandro Nova, Elena Fumagalli e Massimiliano Rossi, Venezia 2010.

I restauri delle sculture di Boboli, 2006-2009, a cura di Barbara Bargilli, Désirée Cappa e Daniele Rapino, Livorno 2010.

Il segreto della cupola del Brunelleschi a Firenze, di Roberto Corazzi e Giuseppe Conti, Firenze 2010.

Gregorio di Lorenzo, il Maestro delle Madonne di Marmo, di Alfredo Bellandi, Morbio Inferiore 2010.

Palazzo Cocchi Serristori. Arte e storia, di Giampaolo Trotta, Firenze 2010.

L’officina di Giotto. Il restauro della Croce di Ognissanti, a cura di Marco Ciatti, Firenze 2010.

Painting, Sculpture, Applied Arts Al centro del disegno. Ricerche ed esperienze in fogli fiorentini del secondo Quattrocento, di Gigetta Dalli Regoli, Pisa 2010.

1910: fuga dalla Capponcina.

D’Annunzio tra Firenze e Francia, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Palazzo Medici Riccardi, 2010-2011), a cura di Elena Puliti, Firenze 2010.

Firenze: itinerari d’autore, di Elodie Lepage, Firenze 2010.

BY

19. Bollettino degli Uffizi. 2008 F RANCESCO A LBERTINI (1510) 2009

3. Luciano Berti.

Attività e scritti al 1987 1987

20. La Galleria di Pietro Leopoldo.

Gli Uffizi al tempo di Giuseppe Pelli Bencivenni 2010

Gli Uffizi

Studi e Ricerche 21 Bollettino

Bollettino degli Uffizi 2009

I MOBILI DI PALAZZO PITTI Il secondo periodo lorenese 1800-1846

I ducati di Lucca, Parma e Modena

A Booklet Devoted to Florentine Art

4. La Nascita di Venere e l’Annunciazione del Botticelli restaurate 1987

21. Bollettino degli Uffizi. 2009 2010

5. I pittori della Brancacci agli Uffizi 1988 6. La Maestà di Duccio restaurata 1990 7. Letture in San Pier Scheraggio 1991 8. La Madonna d’Ognissanti di Giotto restaurata 1992 9. La statua del guerriero ferito.

Storia, prospettive esegetiche, restauri di un originale greco 1992 10. Itinerario laurenziano 1993 11. Giuseppe Maria Crespi nei Musei fiorentini 1993 12. Gli Uffizi 1944-1994.

Interventi museografici e progetti 1994 13. Il Discobolo degli Uffizi.

Le vicende collezionistiche, i restauri dal Cinquecento ad oggi 1994 14. I restauri dell’attentato.

Consuntivo 1993-1995 1995 15. Forestieri in Galleria: visitatori, direttori e custodi agli Uffizi dal 1769 al 1785 2007

I MOBILI DI PALAZZO PITTI

edited by David Madden and Nicholas Spike; Introductory essay: John T. Spike

18. Bollettino degli Uffizi. 2006-2007 2008

Il secondo periodo lorenese 1800-1846 I ducati di Lucca, Parma e Modena

by Anne Markham Schulz

17. La Galleria “rinnovata” e “accresciuta”.

Gli Uffizi nella prima epoca lorenese 2008

Centro Di

a cura di Silvia Benassai Mara Visonà

Waldemar H. de Boer

2. Il Tondo di Michelangelo e il suo restauro 1985

16. La stanza dei Pollaiolo.

I restauri, una mostra, un nuovo ordinamento 2007

In copertina:

Centro Di

Quiete, invenzione e inquietudine exhibition catalogue edited by Silvia Benassai Mara Visonà

detto Giovanni da San Giovanni, G a l l e r i a d e g l i Giovanni U f f i zMannozzi, i

Centro Di

Decollazione di San Giovanni Battista (part.), San Giovanni Valdarno (Arezzo), Museo della Basilica di Santa Maria delle Grazie

Centro Di

Memorial of Many Statues and Paintings in the Illustrious City of Florence

by Francesco Albertini (1510) Annotated edition

by Waldemar H. de Boer, edited by Michael W. Kwakkelstein English edition

Centro Di

Fax (+39) 055.65.30.214

in the art of northern Italy and currently teaches art history in Florence.

Gli Uffizi Studi e Ricerche

1. Restauri: La Pietà del Perugino e la Madonna delle arpie di Andrea del Sarto 1984

M EMORIAL OF M ANY S TATUES AND PAINTINGS IN THE I LLUSTRIOUS C ITY OF F LORENCE

Bollettino degli Uffizi 2009

P.O. Box 66 r 50123 Firenze Italy orders@olschki.it r internet: www.olschki.it

Richard Anuszkiewicz Paintings & Sculptures.

Catalogue raisonné

In English

Viaggio in Italia. Da Venezia a Firenze, di Théophile Gautier, a cura di Annalisa Bottacin, Milano 2010.

Gli Uffizi Studi e Ricerche 21

Tel. (+39) 055.65.30.684

LEO S. OLSCHKI

The Author intorno Il Seicento fiorentino Waldemar H. de Boer (1975) has been affiliated to the Dutch University Institute for Art History in Florence as San a researcher since 2000. His PhD. thesis on Marco Boschini’s 1676 artistic guidebook to Vicenza was a Giovanni dapublished Giovanni in 2008 (Centro Di) on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Dutch Institute. He is specialized

FRANCESCO ALBERTINI (1510)

CASA EDITRICE Casella postale 66 r 50123 Firenze email: celso@olschki.it r pressoffice@olschki.it

Published six years after Michelangelo’s David was installed in Piazza della Signoria, Francesco Albertini’s Memorial of Many Statues and Paintings in the Illustrious City of Florence is the earliest known systematic description of the city’s artistic treasures and can be considered the prototype for all successive guidebooks to Florence. The present annotated and fully illustrated edition of the Memorial enables the reader to become familiar with the extraordinary wealth of masterpieces Florence could boast in 1510, many of which have long since been dispersed.

Waldemar H. de Boer

Dello stesso autore, nei «Quaderni» della Fondazione Carlo Marchi: Le carte di un teatro. L’archivio storico del Teatro Comunale di Firenze e del «Maggio Musicale Fiorentino» (1928-1952). 2008, cm 17 ¥ 24, 2 tomi di xxxiv-956 pp. con 8 tavv. f.t., raccolti in cofanetto. ô 105,00 [isbn 978 88 222 5761 1]

Centro Di

Woodcarving and Woodcarvers in Venice 1350-1550

In English

Quiete invenzione e inquietudine

MEMORIAL OF MANY STATUES AND PAINTINGS IN THE ILLUSTRIOUS CITY OF FLORENCE

BY

Fondazione Carlo Marchi. Studi, vol. 26 2010, cm 22,5 ¥ 30, xvi-470 pp. con 1759 figg. n.t. a colori. ô 110,00 [isbn 978 88 222 6009 3]

Centro Di

Un altro Lorenzo. Ippolito de’ Medici tra Firenze e Roma (1511-1535), di Guido Rebecchini, Venezia 2010.

new books Centro Di spring 2011

Centro Di

This volume begins the Inventory of Drawings from the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino’s Historical Archive, belonging to the sketches, scene models, costume illustrations and stage equipment drawings category.For each piece in the collection, the following information is provided: inventory number, name of the opera or ballet or theatrical piece, choreographer or composer or writer, performance dates, acts, characters, technique, measures, signatures, dates, autograph annotations and other period notes.

Centro Di

Quiete, invenzione e inquietudine. Il Seicento fiorentino intorno a Giovanni da San Giovanni

cumentari, questo inventario mette a disposizione di coloro che studiano il disegno teatrale del Novecento una vera e propria ‘carta d’identità’ dei pezzi in collezione, completa di ogni dato oggettivo, numeri d’inventario, nome dell’opera o del balletto o dello spettacolo teatrale, compositore o coreografo o scrittore, date di esecuzione, atti, personaggi, tecnica, misure, firme, datazioni, annotazioni autografe e annotazioni d’epoca.

Tra i circa milleottocento elaborati figurano disegni di importanti protagonisti della pittura italiana del ’900 come Mario Sironi, Giorgio De Chirico, Gino Severini, Felice Casorati, Gianni Vagnetti e Gino Carlo Sensani.

Catalogue Raisonné

Riccardo Muti al Teatro Comunale di Firenze 1968-1982, a cura di Giulia Perni, Pisa 2010.

Fra’ Mansueto da Castiglione. Un legato apostolico presso Pisa, Firenze, Londra e Parigi alla metà del Duecento, di Gabriele Taddei, Firenze 2010.

PA I N T I N G S & S C U L P T U R E S 1 9 4 5 – 2 0 0 1

David Madden and Nicholas Spike

Regolamento dei Regi Spedali di Santa Maria Nuova e Bonifazio, edizione a cura di Esther Diana e Marco Geddes da Filicaia, Firenze 2010.

Firenze. Segreti, storie, misteri, curiosità, di Pierluigi Bacci, Firenze 2010.

Anuszkiewicz

Centro Di

Prende inizio con questo primo volume la pubblicazione dell’Inventario dei disegni dell’Archivio Storico delTeatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, appartenenti alla categoria dei bozzetti, dei modellini di scena, dei figurini per i costumi e dei disegni per l’attrezzatura scenica. Il carattere della pubblicazione si ispira fortemente a quello di altri inventari di disegni, pur nella specificità del caso, e si riferisce ai cataloghi delle mostre che il Teatro Comunale di Firenze ha avviato – per primo in Italia – dal 1979. Riferimento principale di questa catalogazione sono inoltre gli inventari curati da Annamaria Petrioli Tofani per il Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi.

Aggiornato ai più recenti repertori do-

PA I N T I N G S & S C U L P T U R E S 1 9 4 5 – 2 0 0 1

Inventario I 1933-1943

WOODCARVING AND WOODCARVERS IN VENICE 1350-1550

I disegni del Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino

WOODCARVING AND WOODCARVERS IN VENICE 1350-1550

Anuszkiewicz

Anne Markham Schulz

Moreno Bucci

Anne Markham Schulz

Racconto di due capitali. Firenze e Roma dopo l’Unità d’Italia, di Attilio Brilli, Torino 2010.

edited by Arte&Libri

info www.centrodi.it

Opere storiche, di Niccolò Machiavelli, a cura di Alessandro Montevecchi e Carlo Marotti, 2 voll., Roma 2010.

via dei Fossi, 32r, Firenze www.artlibri.it

Michelangelo: i due lottatori. Un bozzetto capolavoro della Casa Buonarroti di Firenze, catalogo della mostra (Roma, Musei Capitolini, 2010), a cura di Pina Ragionieri, Cinisello Balsamo 2010.

Memorie francescane della provincia di Firenze, di Ottaviano Giovannetti, Firenze 2010.

Firenze e la Toscana. Genesi e trasformazioni di uno stato (XIV-XIX secolo), a cura di Jean Boutet, Sandro Landi e Olivier Rouchon, Firenze 2010.

Le chiese II. Arte e storia degli edifici religiosi a Firenze, di Lara Mercanti e Giovanni Straffi, Firenze 2010.

Bronzino: pittore e poeta alla corte dei Medici, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Palazzo Strozzi, 2010-2011), a cura di Carlo Falciani e Antonio Natali, Firenze 2010.

Lorenzo e Giovanna. Vita e arte nella Firenze del Quattrocento, di Gert Jan van der Sman, Firenze 2010.

Alle porte con i sassi. Storia e guida alle porte delle mura di Firenze, di Luca Anichini, Firenze 2010.

La primavera perfetta. Storia dei fiori a Firenze tra arte e scienza, di Cristina Acidini Luchinat, Firenze 2010.

Metalli islamici a Firenze nel Rinascimento, di Marco Spallanzani, Firenze 2010.

Le grandi battaglie toscane, di Mauro Bonciani, con schede storiche di Ugo Barlozzetti, Firenze 2010.

Accusare e proscrivere il nemico pubblico. Legislazione antighibellina e persecuzione giudiziaria a Firenze (1347-1378), di Vieri Mazzoni, Ospedaletto 2010.

Firenze futurista 1909-1920, atti del Convegno di Studi (Firenze, Gabinetto Vieusseux, 15-16 maggio 2009), a cura di Gloria Manghetti, Firenze 2010.

Autoritratte: artiste di capriccioso e destrissimo ingegno, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Galleria degli Uffizi, Reali Poste, 2010-2011), a cura di Giovanna Giusti, Firenze 2010.

La penna e la spada. L’unità d’Italia fra Torino e Firenze, di Cosimo Ceccuti, Firenze 2010.

Acque, uomini e marmi tra Firenze e il mare. Per una storia del basso corso dell’Arno in età moderna, di Emanuela Ferretti e Davide Turrini, Firenze 2010.

Grafica liberty e déco a Firenze, di Carlo Cresti, Firenze 2010.

Il principe in fuga e la principessa straniera. Vita e teatro alla corte di Ferdinando de’ Medici e Violante di Baviera (1675-1731), di Leonardo Spinelli, Firenze 2010.

a selection of books on Florentine art and architecture, published in Italy and abroad in 2011.

Michelucci architetto, a cura di Carlo Cresti, Firenze 2010.

Giovanni Martinelli da Montevarchi, pittore in Firenze, testi di Sandro Bellesi, Francesca Baldassari, Luca Canonici, Liletta Fornasari, Giovanni Pagliarulo e Gianni Papi, Firenze 2011.

Il mercante, l’ospedale, i fanciulli. La donazione di Francesco Datini, Santa Maria Nuova e la fondazione degli Innocenti, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Spedale degli Innocenti, 20102011), a cura di Stefano Filipponi, Eleonora Mazzocchi e Ludovica Sebregondi, Firenze 2010.

La battaglia di Anghiari. Il giorno che salvò il Rinascimento, di Niccolò Capponi, Milano 2011.

4 novembre 1966. Fotografie dell’alluvione a Firenze, a cura di Marilena Tamassia, Livorno 2010.

Ghirlandaio. Una famiglia di pittori del Rinascimento fra Firenze e Scandicci, catalogo della mostra (Scandicci, Castello dell’Acciaiolo, 20102011), a cura di Annamaria Bernacchioni, Firenze 2010.

Giuseppe Zocchi. Vedute delle ville e d’altri luoghi della Toscana, a cura di Mario Bevilacqua, Roma 2010.

Stefano della Bella (1610-1664).

Disegni della Biblioteca Marucelliana di Firenze, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Biblioteca Marucelliana, 20102011), a cura di Anna Forlani Tempesti e Riccardo Spinelli, Firenze 2010.

History

Francesco Conti, di Federico Berti, Firenze 2010.

Firenze: il progetto urbanistico.

Scritti e contributi 1975-2010, a cura di Pietro Giorgieri, Firenze 2010.

Giornali e riviste a Firenze 19431946, a cura di Franco Contorbia, Firenze 2010.

Repertorio delle sculture in Palazzo Pitti, di Maddalena De Luca Savelli, Firenze 2010.

Firenze nascosta – 2. I beni architettonici, di Marco Ferri, Firenze 2010.

Building-in-Time. From Giotto to Alberti and Modern Oblivion, di Marvin Trachtenberg, New Haven and London 2010.

Novecento sedotto. Il fascino del Seicento tra le due guerre, catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Fondazione Bardini, 2010), a cura di Anna Mazzanti, Lucia Mannini e Valentina Gensini, Firenze 2010.

books about town

Archaeology and Anthropology

Bollettino degli Uffizi 2009 edited by Federica Ghezzi with Marino Marini Series ‘Gli Uffizi.

Studi e Ricerche’ n. 20, edited by Antonio Natali

Centro Di

I mobili di Palazzo Pitti.

Il secondo periodo lorenese 1800-1846.

Tome II. I Ducati di Lucca, Modena e Parma Series and volume edited by Enrico Colle

57

in tuscany

Art in the beautiful Tuscany countryside. The landscape of the region includes not only gardens, parks and nature reserves: these pages illustrate where nature makes space for art and unites with the creativity of international artists.

Spaces where it is possible to enjoy Tuscany’s natural heritage and interact with contemporary experience.

Firenze

Pistoia

Prato

Parco Museo d’Arte Ambientale di Poggio Valicaia

Villa Celle

Parco Museo Quinto Martini

via della Poggiona, 6a Scandicci (Firenze) 055 768885 open: from November to February, Saturday and Sunday 9-16.30; March and October, Tuesday to Sunday 9-18; from April to September Tuesday to Sunday 9-20

www.comune.scandicci.fi.it

Centro d’Arte La Loggia

Fattoria La Loggia via Collina, 40 Montefiridolfi, San Casciano in Val di Pesa (Firenze) 055 8244288 open: by appointment only

via Montalese, 7 Santomato (Pistoia) fax 0573 479486 open: from May to September by appointment only goricoll@tin.it

via Pistoiese Seano, Carmignano (Prato) 055 8750250 / 8750231 Pro Loco Carmignano 055 8712468 open: every day

www.goricoll.it

www.cultura.prato.it/musei www.comune.carmignano.po.it

Parco di Pinocchio

via San Gennaro, 3 Collodi, Pescia (Pistoia) tel/fax 0572 429342 open: from February to November, every day 8.30 until sunset; from November to December, major holidays and the day before those holidays 9 until sunset, with the exception of booked groups

Museo all’Aperto d’arte contemporanea di Luicciana

www.pinocchio.it

www.comune.cantagallo.po.it

www.fattorialaloggia.com/centroarte.htm

Parco Museo Lo Spirito del Luogo - Collezione Permanente d’arte contemporanea

Villa medicea La Magia via Vecchia Fiorentina, 63 Quarrata (Pistoia) open: 3rd Sunday of the month guided tour at 15.30 booking required 0573 774500 / 771213 334 8778007 info@villalamagia.com

streets and squares of Luicciana, Cantagallo (Prato) cantagallo@comune.cantagallo.po.it open: always open

Anfiteatro della Val di Bisenzio di Giuliano Mauri via di Luogomano Cantagallo (Prato) Ufficio cultura del Comune 0574 950836 open: always open

www.comune.cantagallo.po.it

www.villalamagia.it

Protected areas and parks run by the Provincia di Firenze Foreste Casentinesi, Monte Falterona e Campigna Padule di Fucecchio Montececeri Podere La Querciola Poggio Ripaghera, Santa Brigida Stagni di Focognano Foresta di Sant’Antonio Torrente Mensola Gabbianello Boscotondo Monti della Calvana Garzaia www.provincia.fi.it/territorio

58

in tuscany

This mapping of Environmental Art Parks in Tuscany is the result of research carried out for a larger study devoted to the “Luoghi dell’arte contemporanea in Toscana” (Places for Contemporary Art in Tuscany), organised by the Regione Toscana and carried out by the Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. The study can be consulted at: www.regione.toscana.it/cultura

Grosseto

Siena

Carrara

Giardino dei Tarocchi

Castello di Ama

Parco della Padula

Loc. Garavicchio, Capalbio (Grosseto) 0564 895122 open: from April to October 14.30-19,30, from November to March booked groups only; closed Sundays and holidays tarotg@tin.it

Fraz. Lecchi, loc. Ama, Gaiole in Chianti (Siena) open: visits by appointment only on Wednesday and Friday at 10 and 14 0577 746031 arte@castellodiama.com

via Provinciale Gragnana, Carrara 0585 641393 info@labiennaledicarrara.it open: only during the Carrara Biennale

www.labiennaledicarrara.it

www.castellodiama.com

www.nikidesaintphalle.com

Giardino di Daniel Spoerri

Seggiano (Grosseto) 0564 950805 open: from Easter to 1 July, Tuesday to Sunday 11– 20; 1 July-15 September every day 11-20 15 September-31 October, Tuesday to Sunday 11-19 from November to March by appointment only

www.danielspoerri.org

Giardino dei Suoni di Paul Fuchs

Podere Pianuglioli, 1 Boccheggiano (Grosseto) open: by appointment only 0566 998221

www.paul.fuchs.com

Giardino Viaggio di Ritorno

Podere il Leccio Loc. Buriano, Castiglione della Pescaia (Grosseto) open: by appointment only 0564 948904 393 9717637 335 5247472 r.lacquaniti@tiscali.it

www.rodolfolacquaniti.com

Site Transitoire di Jean-Paul Philippe

Podere Fonteluco via Fonteluco, 15 Serre di Rapolano (Siena) 0577 704277 open: every day

www.jeanpaulphilippe.eu

Giardino di Sculture di Kurt Laurenz Metzler

Loc. Il Poggio, Jesa (Siena) open: visits by appointment only 0577 758130

Livorno Open Air Museum di Italo Bolano

Portoferraio, Isola d’Elba (Livorno) open: by appointment only 0565 914570 347 6434610 arte@italobolano.com

www.klmetzler.com

Selva di Sogno di Deva Manfredo

Podere San Giorgio, Frosini (Siena) open: by appointment only from March December Saturday and Sunday 10.30-18.30, Tuesday and Friday 14-18 333 4330183

www.devamanfredo-stoneart.com

Parco Sculture del Chianti

SP 9, Loc. La Fornace 48-49 Pievasciata (Siena) open: every day 10 until sunset, from November to March by appointment only 0577 357151

www.chiantisculpturepark.it

Giardino di Daniel Spoerri.

Daniel Spoerri, Corridoio di Damocle 2002/2008 Photo by Paolo Guidotti

59

architecture walks

hese architecture walks offer fascinating insights into the city beyond, or immediately within, the ‘viali di circonvallazione’, the ring-road encircling the city centre. The walks explore un-monumentalised areas of the contemporary urban fabric, generally far from tourist traffic. This is the city of today, although there are also hints of what the city has been, will be, or could have been. The buildings en route have been chosen not on the basis of any stylistic criteria or critical judgement, but rather because they represent episodes in the history of architecture that have been important for their impact, both visual and otherwise, in the corresponding urban context.

T

Florence and the slow establishment of public green areas

From the middle of the 15th century the city of Florence became famous for its gardens with their geometric compartments and their trimmed topiary hedges. Although an essential component of the new Renaissance palazzo, they were however the exclusive prerogative of the mercantile and later aristocratic class, private areas reserved for family comfort and leisure, and private parties. Boboli particularly attracted international attention, first as a prototype of the Italian-style garden, then later as a model of typological integration between stately home and adjoining park.

The other area we tend to regard today as the mother of all public green areas in Florence, the Parco delle Cascine, was in reality annexed to Medici possessions (by Duke Alessandro, ca 1535) as a hunting reserve and ‘farm’ devoted to agricultural production and the rearing of livestock. A use of the area that would continue until the final decades of the 18th century, when, on the wishes of the ‘enlightened’ Pietro Leopoldo, and with the large-scale works of reorganization contracted out to Giuseppe Manetti, it was “stripped of its old wildness” (Zuccagni Orlandini, 1832) and began to be made into a park that was open, albeit only occasionally, to the public. It was the Medici, however, who nurtured the idea of urban green areas in France, a country that would make a significant contribution to the debate on city parks. In 1564 Caterina de’ Medici designed the central nucleus of the Jardin des Tuileries in the Italian style; Maria de’ Medici gave the Luxembourg Palace, which she wanted “in the shape and style of Palazzo Pitti”, a park of 24 hectares and, ahead of the majestic interventions of the Sun King, laid out the great tree-lined Avenue des Champs-Élysées. With Louis XIV (1638-1715) and the works of André Le Nôtre, the great tradition of French-style gardens began. However, contact with green areas was still the prerogative of an elite.

60

Passeggiata delle Cascine, “Viale della Regina”, Firenze, c.1890, photo Archivi Alinari-Archivio Brogi, Florence.

edited by Emilia Daniele*

A quite different situation existed in England, where an early social use of urban gardens and parks was widespread from the middle of the 17th century. Hyde Park, a royal property, was open to the public, as was Kensington Gardens and St. James’s Park; it might happen, therefore, for the king and the people to watch horse-races there together. The first squares were built, city gardens bounded by residential perimeters, fenced off and accessible only to the occupants of the surrounding houses (the model later being adopted by the French and in the rest of the world as open and more specifically public areas). Pleasure gardens, among the most celebrated places of public recreation in Georgian London, ‘equipped’ with all kinds of amusements (plays, shows, concerts, walks, leisurely encounters), also became extremely popular. The most famous, Vauxhall Gardens, was opened in 1660 by an enterprising London widow, and was initially free of charge and open to every social class: income originally came from the drinks and snacks that were sold in kiosks and stalls, and only later was an entrance fee charged. The English social structure – where (in contrast to absolutist France) there existed a clear distinction between economic power and political power, thus generating a particular relationship and sentiment between the people and the monarchy, as well as greater entrepreneurial freedom – was in fact the seedbed from which the earliest notions about public parks grew up. A significant factor was the tradition of greens, or commons, or open fields, a tradition so deeply-rooted and fiercely defended (Moorfields in London comes to mind) as to prompt the monarchy to enter into the private ownership of such lands and stand as guarantors of the rights to their public use. On the other hand, it was also at the root of the serious problems affecting the working classes in the industrial era, the main reason why England was the forge of innovative urbanistic and social theories, milestones in elevating public green areas to the status of structural elements in modern cities: from the Utopian settlement models of Robert Owen (textile mill village of New Lanark, Scotland 1799) and the numerous projects for ideal cities of the mid-1800s (for example Bourneville, near Birmingham), to Ebenezer Howard’s proposed garden cities (theorised in 1898 and put into practice for the first time at Letchworth, in 1903, and at Welwyn, from 1919), later taken as a model for the satellite cities which from the 1940s sprang up around London (the new towns).

Florence under the last Medici rulers was relatively unaffected by this ferment and, up until the 18th century and even beyond, more than social demands it welcomed the stylistic tendencies spreading from France and England – including the new fashion for the ‘English-style’ landscaped park. It was only with the important reforms of Pietro Leopoldo (17651790), promoted to bring Tuscany in line with the major European powers, that new attention was focused on the question of urban green areas.

Determined to develop the consciousness of a modern rational society, the Lorraine sovereign instituted specific administrative organs to take care of trees, the number of which were increased in various areas of the city and, above all, gave to Florence its first public garden: the Parterre fuori Porta San Gallo (2); furthermore, he made efforts to open (however occasionally) the gates of an extensively redesigned Boboli, only to later divert the public, following damage

*Emilia Daniele is an architect. Research Fellow in the History of Architecture and Urban Studies and professor at the Facoltà di Ingegneria CivileArchitettura at Pisa University. She assists the chair of the Associazione Dimore Storiche Italiane – Sezione Toscana in the organisation of cultural events, such as the national and international studies conferences. She edits volumes of architecture, art and fiction.

architecture walks

inflicted on the garden during festivities, to the renewed Parco delle Cascine, which nonetheless continued to retain its status as a grand-ducal possession open to the public only on special occasions (for example the Festa del Grillo, on Ascension Day). It was Elisa Baciocchi, following the failure to transform Boboli into an English-style garden, who finally succeeded in opening up the Parco delle Cascine: the Baluardo della Serpe was demolished to make the entrance square easier to access; the path bordering the river was widened to make possible the transit of carriages; and more avenues were created to celebrate the frequent military parades that the public could attend from the now accessible lawns. But, above all, it was now urgent that Florence too was equipped with ‘jardins et promenades publiques’ consolidated structures typical of French urban life; with the systematic planting of mulberry trees along the walkway inside the walls, the city acquired its first tree-lined avenue for ‘public promenades’. The restored grand-ducal government (1814) inherited and proceeded with the project of the avenue inside the walls, which, together with the Parterre, continued to be the only public green area in the city; the Cascine, although “frequented by all classes of people, whether foreign or national” (Repetti, 1833-1845), remained part of the “Imperiali e Regie Bandite”. The process of creating green areas within the city proceeded slowly and spasmodically. Leopoldo II, having destroyed the mazes to make the large carriage bearing avenue of Boboli, intensified their development. However, while the new residential neighbourhood of Barbano was built around a paved square (present-day piazza Indipendenza) (3), the original project providing for its arrangement around a garden bordered with trees and benches having been disregarded, the first residential intervention in Florence inspired by the English square had to wait until 1865 in piazza dʼAzeglio (4) and then in piazza Savonarola (5). The choice of Florence as capital city of the unified Kingdom of Italy marked a clear watershed in the history of the city’s public green areas. With the plan of the cityʼs enlargement (1) and the consequent demolition of the walls to make way for the ‘viali di circonvallazione’ – in the 19th century envisaged as a ring-road consisting of a continuous and harmonious series of squares, gardens and public tree-lined promenades – Florence became the first city in the country in

which green areas and architecture were finally integrated and became a unitary component of the urban design. Giuseppe Poggi, the architect who drew up the plan, projected the city onto the international scene, bringing its experience to the same level as that of the most modern European metropolises. The use of urban green areas as the unifying element of single interventions found immediate references in the Grands Travaux of Paris directed by Haussmann (from 1853) and in the Viennese Ring (from 1857), while the order and clarity of John Nash’s urban projects in London (first and foremost Regent’s Park), which Poggi admired as models of highly qualified residential settlements, represented the most direct inspiration for that idea of a city spread out in green areas that finds its loftiest expression in the viale dei Colli, the exemplary ‘garden-city’ of Florence. References that nonetheless Poggi interpreted in the context of a purely Tuscan culture and sense of proportion, acquired in two decades of professional experience at the service of a refined and cosmopolitan private clientele. The need for new trees on a large scale induced Poggi to request the direct collaboration of an expert botanist: in 1867 he called on Attilio Pucci, the former Head Gardener of Boboli in pre-unification Florence, and one of the very first and fundamental members of the Società Toscana di Orticoltura (founded in 1854). A key figure who in addition to creating the city’s first system of public green areas, having also the task of maintaining them, stimulated the institution and consolidation of the “service of public gardens and promenades” (1874).

The economic crisis resulting from the transfer of the capital to Rome (1871) had immediate consequences on the perfecting of this plan: a committee was appointed to reduce the costs of management of public gardens and promenades; the rush to buy lots of building land on the viale dei Colli came to a halt; and there was no time to execute the project for the avenue on the Bellosguardo hill, which would have connected the Cascine to Porta Romana. Notwithstanding the various critical positions that have always accompanied the plan, however we choose to look at it today, we can only smile bitterly at the frequent appeals made by Poggi to limit many areas of his project to the traffic of horse-drawn carriages, avoiding steam-driven ones... (to be continued in the next issue of VisitArt)

construction: 1865 and 1866 project: Giuseppe Poggi

1 Project and plan of the city’s enlargement

The 1864 decision to transfer the Italian capital from Turin to Florence brought, on the one hand, the desire to give the city a new image, one worthy of modernly representing Italy and, on the other, to give it new housing in response to an already compelling need that was now amplified by the expected arrival of numerous functionaries of the new State. The commission elected to confront the emergency decreed the demolition of the city walls and the construction of a large boulevard for ‘public promenade’ in their place, so that the new residential districts would form an entirety with the historical centre.

Formulation of the plan was entrusted to Giuseppe Poggi, who in only two months produced a draft project containing the premises that would condition the future town-planning developments of Florence. For a period of six years (from 1865 to 1871, when the capital was transferred to Rome), an astonishing number of decisions and actions were undertaken in rapid succession: the creation of the tree-lined boulevard in place of the walls (demolished between 1865 and 1869), the criss-cross layout of the new districts, the erection of embankments and the building of the new Zecca Vecchia, Ferrucci, Serristori and Torrigiani “lungarni” along the river, and the laying out of the Viale dei Colli. These were joined by the architectural design of the entire plan (for example, the buildings overlooking today’s piazza Beccaria, piazza della Libertà and piazza Poggi, the ‘Rampe’ of piazza Poggi, the large panoramic terrace of piazzale Michelangelo and the Loggia-café that was initially planned to house copies of works by Michelangelo, and the great flight of steps for the Basilica of San Miniato).

An already qualifying element of his earlier professional activity, greenery assumed a fundamental role in the architect’s extraordinary experience in town planning, one that was pioneering for Italy: Poggi conceived the boulevards on the right bank of the Arno River as a sort of public green belt, formed by the harmonious and continuous alternation of tree-lined streets, parterres, gardens and squares around the old city gates. Starting from the southeast end of the ‘circuit’ with the Pratoni della Zecca redesigned as a “Grand Parterre” with a “Grand Bathing Establishment” on the river (see VisitArt 1), up to the Cascine Park’s large new entrance plaza (then called piazza Vittorio Emanuele) on the north end, the straight tracts of the boulevards traversed the new piazzas Beccaria, Donatello and Libertà, the garden of the Fortezza da Basso, and the piazza of Porta al Prato, each carefully designed to offer breadth and a monumental quality to the entire operation. While to provide the new residential districts with greenery, Poggi adopted the model of the open square, viale dei Colli was instead conceived as a sequence of little villas nestled in greenery: a ‘garden-city’ that unfolded along a winding route connecting the sites of the monuments in the hills (San Miniato, San Salvatore), making for splendid panoramic views over the city, which climax at piazzale Michelangelo. Porter’s lodges were sited all along the route to guarantee safety and, in addition to its marvellous views, viale dei Colli also offered other attractions: the “CaffèRistorante” at the piazzale and a public garden, the Tivoli, which enlivened the piazzale Galilei area with “a concert hall, cafés, an oriental bazaar, a daytime theatre... a carousel that was taken down when the capital was transferred to Rome. Finally the Cascine acquired tenure as the first public park of Florence. At first entrusted to a French landscapist, the park’s modification was promptly inserted into Poggi’s plan precisely for it to become an integral part of a single urban system. The trends of the various areas were delineated, the same ones as today: to the left of the thoroughfare formed by the viale degli Olmi that then becomes Viale dell’Aeronautica, the dimension of landscape and woodland was developed; to the right, the Palazzina Reale housed the Caffè Ristorante Doney, along with a large hall for receptions, while the farms beside it were contracted out for the installation of numerous sports facilities (including the new recreation ground near the motorcycle and cycle racing stadium). The area of the Cascine, however, represents the area of greatest difference between the draft project and the plan’s final implementation: Poggi envisioned it as even more grandiose, connected by an iron bridge (aligned with the piazzale del Re) to the left bank of the Arno River, intended to be the site of the large quadrilateral of Campo di Marte, which was instead moved to the east of the city where it still is today.

G. Poggi, Sui lavori per l’ingrandimento di Firenze, Firenze 1882

61

architecture walks

Public Parks in London

One of the great attractions of Britain, and especially of its capital city, London, are its public parks, squares and other green areas. These urban spaces tend to be zealously defended by the local populace and in many cases – though not all, alas – they are well planted and maintained by dedicated teams of gardeners.

The British love of gardening is well known – indeed, one could say it is the nation’s ‘vernacular artform’, just as cookery is in France – and this plays in to a general expectation of a high standard of horticulture in parks. Thousands of people, tourists and locals alike, visit London’s royal parks to enjoy the plantings on display in season – the roses on swags in Queen Mary’s Rose Garden, Regent’s Park, for example, or perhaps the imaginative modern plantings involving drifts of ornamental grasses in St James’s Park. There is also much of architectural interest to be found in Britain’s parks – recently restored historic buildings in public parks include the magnificent glasshouse on Sefton Park, Liverpool, and the extensive ‘Palladian’ garden of temples and statues made by the 3rd Earl of Burlington in the early 18th-century in what is now Chiswick Park, publicly owned by the local authority, free to visit (like all public parks today) and open all year.

The health-giving properties of trees and green spaces in urban environments is often used as an argument for the encouragement of more green space in cities, but there is nothing new about this idea. In his 1722 manual The City Gardener, Thomas Fairchild recommended planting trees in urban areas specifically to help remedy air pollution, while James Peller Malcolm in 1808 suggested that the provision of squares and wider streets in cities such as London, Bath and Edinburgh was allowing air to circulate more freely: “Pure air so essential to the preservation of life, now circulates through the new streets; squares calculated for ornament, health and the higher ranks of the community are judiciously dispersed and their centres converted into beautiful gardens”.

With the onset of the Victorian era in the 19th century, the philanthropic, improving impulses of ‘city fathers’ (councillors) and rich industrialist benefactors in Britain led to the creation of the first public parks. These were designed as an amenity for the people, as a way of improving public health and also as a morally preferable alternative, for the working classes, than visiting the pub, gambling or indulging in other nefarious activities. The unspoken assumption was that an orderly and wellmaintained parks system would engender an orderly and well-maintained populace.

The mid- to late-19th century was undoubtedly the highlight of publicpark and garden construction in Britain, and there have been relatively few new parks built since, though the starkly modernist Thames Barrier Park and the ecological Mile End Park (both in London) are exceptions, as is the Olympic Park now under construction in time for the 2012 London Olympics. On the other hand, a massive injection of funding appeared in the first decade of the 21st century courtesy of the National

62

Crystal Palace, London: terraces and fountains, 1851.

Photo Henry Delamotte, Raccolte Museali Fratelli Alinari, Florence

Tim Richardson*

Lottery Fund, which instituted an urban parks programme that led to the restoration of dozens of Victorian parks up and down the country. Now the flowerbeds of previously dilapidated parks are blooming again, bandstands sparkle and boating lakes are full to the brim. In many British towns and cities, public parks have once again become playgrounds for the people.

The two main phases in the history of Britain’s parks and open public spaces are the Georgian garden squares of the 18th century and the parks created in the 19th-century Victorian period.

Georgian Squares The garden square evolved in London between about 1630 and 1680, paving the way for the speculative housebuilders who created the celebrated 18th-century squares which still stand today in Bloomsbury to the north and Belgravia to the west. Some early squares evolved out of enclosed vegetable gardens or from enclosed fields. Covent Garden was once a kitchen garden for Westminster Abbey (“Covent” came from “convent”) and indeed it is fitting that until the mid-20th century its grand piazza was London’s premier vegetable market. Leicester Square (now the place to see a film in the West End) was originally Leicester Fields, an enclosed area of common land. Later squares were essentially created as amenities for the grand houses then being constructed on the then outskirts of the existing city – squares such as Russell Square, Soho Square, Bloomsbury Square and – one of the largest and grandest of all – Grosvenor Square. Today, most of these squares are open to the public and – shaded by ancient plane trees and watered with fountains – they remain much loved and used.

Victorian Parks The first public parks were generally funded by private philanthropists: Joseph Strutt paid for Derby Arboretum (in the English Midlands) in 1840 – which is considered the first public park in the world – while Prince’s Park, Liverpool, was designed in 1842 by Joseph Paxton, who was also Head Gardener for the Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth House at the time, and who went on to design the great Crystal Palace in London. It was intended that public parks should be healthy and improving – quite different to the well-established existing tradition of commercial ‘pleasure gardens’ in London, which offered music, dancing, eating and many other diversions. The great gardening journalist John Claudius Loudon was one of the earliest advocates for public parks; it was he who designed Derby Arboretum in 1840. Times of opening at the early parks were limited and a fee was generally charged on certain days. At Derby Arboretum, Loudon created large landformed berms of earth as a means of hiding the edges of the park (and views of its industry and housing) while also providing a sense of privacy for strollers.

Grosvenor Square at the beginning of the 19th century.

*Tim Richardson is a garden historian and contemporary landscape critic based

in London. He is the author of a number of books (Futurescapes appears this year) and writes regularly for the ‘Daily Telegraph’, ‘Financial Times’, ‘Country Life’ and other publications.

architecture walks

The first properly municipal park – in that it was paid for with public money – was that at Birkenhead, Liverpool, designed by Paxton in 1843, with serpentine walks, undulating lawns, lakes and ornamental buildings.

Frederick Law Olmsted was to use Birkenhead as the prime inspiration for Central Park, New York – there are striking similarities, especially in terms of topography and path/road layout. Victoria Park in east London soon followed, and then an avalanche of other public parks in towns and cities as the century wore on. From the earliest period – the 1840s – the health-giving properties of parks as the ‘lungs of the city’ were noted, especially in the context of ongoing cholera epidemics. Sporting facilities became increasingly important and huge, grandiose ornamented drinking fountains reflected the power of the temperance (anti-alcohol) movement.

By the late-19th century bandstands, pagodas, ‘Swiss’ cottages, small natural-history museums and glasshouses for botanical collections had become commonplace in parks, alongside curiosities such as the mock dinosaurs in Crystal Palace Park (which are still there today).

The late-19th century was also the heyday of seaside resort gardens and public plantings in places such as Torquay on the south coast, or Scarbrough in the north of England. Such plantings were usually themed along ‘exotic’ lines, with palms, cordylines and other spiky-leaved plants – immaculately maintained at great expense – adding to the cheerful holiday atmosphere which visitors still expect today.

...brief history of the parterres and the squares of Florence (as a comparison with the contribution of Tim Richardson) 2 Parterre outside Porta San Gallo

3 Garden of piazza Indipendenza piazza Indipendenza construction: 1842-1844 project: Flaminio Chiesi

between piazza della Libertà, via Madonna della Tosse, largo Adone Zoli, via Mafalda di Savoia and via del Ponte Rosso construction: 1767-1768 project: Anastagio Anastagi, gardener Ulderico Prucher The first garden in Florence designed for public promenades. Attempts by the city administration to obtain authorization to build on the land, an idea opposed by Poggi, finally got the upper hand in 1914. The area, intended as an exhibition venue, was occupied by the Palazzo delle Esposizioni di Belle Arti (1914-1922, V. Tognetti, D. Fantappié) and later by the seat of the Mostra Mercato dell’Artigianato (1939, S. Pastorini, M. Pellegrini). The Town Plan of 1962 decreed the transferral of the exhibition venue to the Fortezza da Basso, and when the proposal to build the new Palazzo di Giustizia here was rejected, the 1973 Variation of the Town Plan promoted its return to a public green area, saving from demolition only the pavilion on Largo Zoli: this proposal was not followed up. Between 1991 and 1993 it acquired its present structure: an underground car-park on three levels and, above ground, an urban park with facilities (P.A. Martini, G. Cantini, P. Colafrancesco), and very little green area.

Photo c.1870.

Late 19th-century drawing.

4 Garden of piazza d’Azeglio

In the middle of the new district of Barbano, Chiesi proposed a garden on the model of the squares, with a perimeter bench surmounted by an iron railing. It was decided instead to pave the entire area, since it was believed that a stone surface would be more useful (in 1848 the square was used as a Campo di Marte, and in 1874 7,000 people gathered here for a music festival). The square was originally dedicated to Maria Antonia, the wife of Leopoldo II; later it was dedicated to Independence in memory of the insurrections which in 1859 led to the expulsion of Leopoldo. The monuments to Bettino Ricasoli (by A. Rivalta) and to Ubaldino Peruzzi (by E. Romanelli) were erected in 1897. The road in the middle connecting via Ridolfi and via XXVII Aprile, which divides the square into two parts, immediately caused controversy: closed in 1858, it was opened again in 1929. In 1954 the two sections were enriched with the creation of lawns and flower-beds and the planting of trees and hedges.

5 Garden of piazza Savonarola piazza Savonarola construction: 1865 project: Giuseppe Poggi

piazza d’Azeglio construction: 1865-1868 project: Ferdinando Bucci (attr.)

Drawing c.1870.

The first public garden in Florence, created as such, and conceived as an integral part of the new neighbourhood of Mattonaia. In the preliminary contract between the city authorities and the building company, it was stipulated that the English square was to be taken as a model, and, in fact, originally the garden was enclosed within an iron railing. The surrounding building lots, most of them reserved for residential use, were highly sought-after and were quickly sold, an additional attraction being the Teatro Principe Umberto, on the corner with via Farini, destroyed by fire in 1890. By the end of the 19th century the garden was in a very poor condition, to the extent that requests were actually made to limit the entrance hours, and the degradation further worsened with the removal of the fence during the Second World War. Playground equipment was first installed in 1955 and added to in 1961, in spite of proposals to again fence off the garden.

Project by Giuseppe Poggi for the piazza, Archivio di Stato di Firenze.

An example of Poggi’s intention to give public gardens to neighbourhoods undergoing residential expansion, leaving free of buildings spaces formed by the road network. The structure derives conceptually from the English square, although here it is without an enclosure, thus almost announcing in advance its use as a place to be crossed rather than a place to stop in: the disproportion between the paved area and green area induced Angiolo Pucci (c. 1880) to describe it as, more than a square, a parterre. In 1882 the monument to Girolamo Savonarola by E. Pazzi, formerly in the Salone dei Cinquecento, was erected in the centre of the square. The numerous acts of vandalism (broken benches, devastated flowerbeds, wrecked kerbstones) forced the municipal authorities to carry out frequent works of restoration, with the addition, already in 1901, of a sentry box for guards. The drawing shows one of the numerous variations designed by Poggi.

63