Lectures and the Bargello Museum

Sunday, December 29, 2019

Yesterday we slept late, and met with some of our Road Scholar group for lunch.  We had an orientation in the late afternoon where we met the others of the group of 20 taking this New Year in Florence Art Tour.  It seems like a lovely group of people, and we had a get-to-know-you cocktail party and dinner.

The education began this morning with a wonderful lecture on the Renaissance, with many references to the history of Greece and Rome and the schism in the Church into the Western Roman Empire (which ended in 416 C.E. with the invasion of the Barbarians), and the Eastern Roman Empire (which lasted another 1000 years until 1453 when the Ottomans invaded).  We heard about the transition from nudity in art to clothed figures, and back again.  We heard of the Church’s requirements for Byzantine art, with the stiffness and lack of movement of religious figures, and much, much more.  It was a wonderful capsule of art from the Greeks to the Renaissance.

Our first day excursion was to the Bargello Museum, a museum of sculpture with an emphasis on Donatello and Michelangelo.  The building dates to 1255 and has had many uses, perhaps the most interesting being that of a prison in the 18^th century, where executions by torture were carried out in the courtyard.  However, in a very advanced move, in 1786 Grand Duke Leopold of Lorraine abolished capital punishment and all the torture instruments were burned in the courtyard.  The building has many other fascinating stories in its history.  Here’s one corner of that famous courtyard:

  

The collection has some examples of pre-Renaissance statuary, including this 14^th century Madonna and Child which make quite a contrast to the sculpture to come:

Perhaps Giotto was the harbinger of the Renaissance as we heard elsewhere, but our wonderful docent lecturer here (and the writing on the wall) claims that it actually began with a competition to design brass panels for the door to the Baptistry of the Cathedral.  The rules of the competition required that the panel tell the story of the binding of Isaac, and the two winners were Ghiberti and Brunelleschi.  We had an intriguing description of these panels, how they are alike and how they differ.  Here’s Brunelleschi’s:

And here’s Ghiberti’s:

We saw many Donatello sculptures in a display of his works.  I’ll highlight two depictions of David, one from 1408, the very beginning of his career, in marble with classical references:

And this one from 1440 during his mature years in bronze.  Here, he portrays David as a pre-adolescent boy:

David’s foot is standing on the head of Goliath:

We learned that Michelangelo was an admirer and follower of Donatello, and that his works were often based on the work of Donatello.  There’s a entire collection of Michelangelo’s sculpture; I’ll highlight one piece with a story.  In 1497 Cardinal Raffaele Rialio commissioned a statue of Bacchus.  Michelangelo’s product was rejected by the cardinal because he felt it depicted Bacchus as drunk!  (It was later bought by another patron). 

The collection was large and wondrous.  We went back to the hotel for a 6:00 PM lecture (the third of the day if you count the docent) scheduled to be on the history of the city of Florence.  It was actually a history of Italy from the city-state days to the present, with an emphasis on Florence, and was very well done.  We were on our own for dinner, and found a local restaurant which was truly wonderful, the best we’ve had since being in Italy.  We are learning the names of pasta which we’ve not known before; our first course tonight was a shared dish of pici.  From Wikipedia, pici is “thick, hand-rolled pasta, like fat spaghetti.”  We had ours with a garlic and tomato sauce and it was wonderful. 

  

Joyce had cod in an almond carpaccio, with tomato coulis and sauteed pioppini mushrooms.  Victor had tuna in a black sesame crust, with turnip top cream and dried tomatoes:

This meal, at a moderately priced local restaurant, was a significant improvement over the Michelin star restaurant we ate in a couple of nights ago.  Tomorrow we’re off to the Palazzo Vecchio for a visit to the residential quarters and a fresco workshop.  I probably will not photo the results of my efforts.