Florence Next Time

By John Ayling

Florence Next Time is a unique guide to the art of Florence, Italy. It is exactly what you are looking for if you are an art lover planning a return journey to that fabulous city - or a first-time visitor with a week or two to spend there. It is neither a conventional tourist guide to Florence nor a book of art history. John Ayling takes you wit

• Language: English
• Publisher: Valentine Press
• Release date: Mar 3, 2015
• ISBN: 9780994224439

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FLORENCE NEXT TIME

A SELECTIVE GUIDE TO THE ART OF THE CITY- ESPECIALLY FOR VISITORS WHO HAVE BEEN THERE BEFORE

BY

JOHN AYLING

First published in 2015 by Valentine Press

Copyright © John Ayling 2015

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 percent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes.

Valentine Press

P.O. Box 527,

Bellingen NSW 2454

www.valentinepress.com.au

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry:

Creator: Ayling, John, 1943-, author

Title: Florence Next Time/John Ayling

ISBN: 9780994224439 (epub)

9780994224446 (mobi)

Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index

Subjects: Art – Italy – Florence – Guidebooks

Architecture – Italy – Florence – Guidebooks

Dewey Number: 709.45511

When you have finished reading Florence Next Time, Valentine Press and John Ayling would appreciate your feedback. There is a Reader’s Comments page on the Valentine Press website: http://valentinepress.com.au/?page_id=1906

About the Author

John Ayling was born in Sydney, Australia, in 1943. He qualified as a lawyer in 1966 and spent the next 46 years in New South Wales court houses trying to sort through confusing facts and persuade bored judges that one version or the other of the facts was the correct one. When he retired and gave up this impossible struggle, he realised that he had been for years much less interested in law than in Art, and particularly in the way visual, representational art changed and transformed itself in measure with human aspirations. Naturally, with time on his hands, this led him to Italy, and to Florence, where that transformation is plain to see on the walls of ancient buildings and in the great museum treasure houses.

This book is a journal of discovery. The author knew from his own past experience that an understanding and appreciation of the art of Florence will not be achieved by a visitor to that city who simply comes, looks and goes away. Such visitors must mentally put what they see in perspective; they need to know something about the times, events and people that produced the works of art, and how beliefs, politics and power plays dictated artistic subjects and even the forms of the buildings being explored. So in this book John Ayling guides the visitor into the society of a Florence now long disappeared, by showing the visitor the clues left behind by the artists.

Contents

About the Author

Introduction

Conventional Names For Traditional Religious Subjects in Renaissance Art

The Cathedral of Florence – the Duomo

The Baptistery (Basilica di San Giovanni Battista)

Museo dell’Opera del Duomo – Museum of the Work of the Duomo

The Other Basilicas of Florence

Introduction

Basilica della Santissima Annunziata (Basilica of the Most Holy Annunciation)

Basilica di Santa Croce (Basilica of the Holy Cross)

Basilica di San Lorenzo (Basilica of Saint Lawrence)

Basilica di San Marco (Basilica of Saint Mark) and Museum

Basilica di Santa Maria del Carmine (Basilica of Saint Mary of the Carmine) and Cappella Brancacci (Brancacci Chapel)

Basilica di Santa Maria Novella (New Basilica of Saint Mary)

Basilica di San Miniato al Monte (Basilica of Saint Minias on the Mount)

Basilica di (Santa Maria del) Santo Spirito (Basilica of the Holy Spirit)

Basilica di Santa Trinita (Basilica of the Holy Trinity)

Florence’s Other Churches

Ognissanti (All Saints’)

Orsanmichele and Museum

Santi Apostoli (Holy Apostles)

Sant’Ambrogio

San Frediano in Cestello

San Felice in Piazza (St Felix in The Square)

San Filippo Neri

San Remigio

Last Suppers

The Last Supper of Andrea del Castagno in Sant’Apollonia

The Last Supper of Domenico Ghirlandaio, in the Convent of Ognissanti

The Last Supper of Perugino, at the Refectory of Foligno

The Last Supper of Andrea del Sarto, Museo del Cenacolo di Andrea del Sarto, San Salvi

The Last Supper of San Marco, by Domenico Ghirlandaio

The Last Supper of Santa Croce, by Taddeo Gaddi

Other Last Suppers: Santa Maria Novella and Santo Spirito

Tours of Major Galleries

Gallery Tour One – Galleria degli Uffizi (the Uffizi)

Gallery Tour Two – Museo Nazionale del Bargello (the Bargello)

Gallery Tour Three – La Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze (the Accademia)

Gallery Tour Four – La Galleria Palatina (the Palatine Gallery) and Royal Apartments

Museum Tours

Museum Tour One – Piazza della Signoria, Loggia dei Lanzi, Palazzo Vecchio

Museum Tour Two – Museo Stefano Bardini

Museum Tour Three – Il Museo Bandini, Fiesole

Museum Tour Four – Other Museums

Ten Lesser-known Treasures

Lesser-known Treasure No 1: Il Chiostro dello Scalzo

Lesser-known Treasure No 2: The Church of Santa Maria Maggiore, Madonna and Child by Coppo di Marcovaldo

Lesser-known Treasure No 3: The tiny Museum in the Loggia del Bigallo

Lesser-known Treasure No 5: The Chimera of Arezzo, in the Museo Nazionale Archeologico di Firenze

Lesser-known Treasure No 6: Perugino’s Crucifixion Fresco in Santa Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi

Lesser-known Treasure No 7: The Badia Fiorentina and the Chiostro degli Aranci

Lesser-known Treasure No 8: The Madonna of the Stairs, and the Battle of the Centaurs, by Michelangelo

Lesser-known Treasure No 9: The Cappella dei Magi (sometimes called the Medici Chapel)

Lesser-known Treasure No 10: The astonishing Pontormo painting in the Capponi Chapel (Cappella Capponi) at the church of Santa Felicita

Biographies of the Artists

Glossary of Terms

Bibliography

Simplified Time-line diagram

Introduction

There cannot be many people who love art who won’t at some time in their lives find themselves in Florence, expecting to see and appreciate the incredibly beautiful paintings and sculptures collected in that little city. There are so many museums, churches and galleries there, crammed with wonderful works. But many visitors find that the sheer number of places to go and things to see makes the experience of Florence overwhelming.

The crowds, the long waits at some venues, the summer heat or winter cold and the miles of corridors to traverse can be exhausting. It’s worse if the visitor, on a first trip to this magical city, has only a day or two in which to see it all. Inevitably, such a visitor leaves Florence disappointed that he or she has fitted so little in to their scheduled time, and with the feeling that Florence has only been sampled rather than fully experienced. Such a person will often be heard to say that next time it will be different – the stay will be longer and the rush of viewing, which makes every gallery a blur and all the churches seem the same, will be avoided. Perhaps then, the visitor says, I will really see Florence.

While this little book may be used by any visitor, it has been written principally as a kind of guide for those fortunate people who do have a next time – the second-time or even third-time visitor to Florence. To make good use of this book, you will need to move quite slowly through the streets and piazzas, spend hours in churches and museums, and dawdle through the galleries, letting all the first-timers pass you as they rush to the next place on their lists or back to their buses. Instead of a day or two in Florence, you may find you need a week or two – or even three. Certainly you should plan for not less than a week. When you get home you will remember where you have been and much of what you have seen. You will not have just done Florence like any tourist, and you may have fallen in love with her forever.

Before I last went to Florence to research this book I imagined that it might be possible to follow in the footsteps of others who have tried to identify the unusual, the out-of-the-way or the quirky things that most visitors miss. Surely, I half-supposed, as Florence’s riches have been mined a thousand times before, unless one can dig up some brand-new treasures a guide like this one will serve no purpose; it will be just more of the same. Of course, I was mistaken. Yes, there are a multitude of amazing works to see outside the name galleries, but even for a repeat visitor, much in those famous galleries will have been missed the first time. The second-time visitor will want to go back and see what he or she failed, due to shortness of time, fatigue or the need to follow a guide at a rushing pace, fully to appreciate – or perhaps even to notice.

For that reason, I have included in this book tours to take, book in hand, through the Uffizi, the Accademia, the Galleria Palatina at the Pitti Palace, and the Bargello. I won’t necessarily be directing you to all the best-known masterpieces: those you almost certainly saw last time, and which you won’t be able to avoid seeing again this time due to their prominent presentation. Instead, I’ll be helping you to look around, at your leisure, and see precious and wonderful things you might otherwise have missed.

In addition, I’ll take you to many not so well-known sights: basilicas, churches, church museums, small secular museums, and all sorts of singular attractions where works of art are to be found. In each place, I have discovered marvels that will enrich your time in Florence, and I will point them out to you and talk about them in the commentary.

Throughout the book, I’ll tell you a little about the artists and their times, and repeat anecdotes and gossip that may help to bring what you are seeing to life.

I have selected some works as LESSER-KNOWN TREASURES. These are works which, I think, are especially lovely and interesting things. Some are reasonably well-known, but others are open secrets which standard guide books may not mention, but which it will be worth your while going out of your way to seek out and admire.

In addition, there is a chapter which gives detailed information about where to find those iconic images of the Last Supper that most visitors miss.

Some limits must be imposed on even an indefatigable researcher, or the task will never be done. In my case, I confess to having made my job manageable by concentrating upon art which was produced in or around Florence itself, by artists who were Italian and who worked in or around Florence, and whose period begins in the thirteenth century and ends with the advent of the style which became Baroque, in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The vast bulk of really fine work displayed in Florence fits within my limits. It includes art from the so-called Pre- or Proto-Renaissance (mostly fourteenth century), the International Gothic style (early fifteenth century), the Early Renaissance, the High Renaissance and Mannerist periods, and some outstanding later work which I judge to be worthy of inclusion. I haven’t included much seventeenth century art – although there is a lot of it, especially in the churches which underwent a Baroque Overhaul. I think – and this is a purely personal opinion (this is a very opiniated book) – that too much of the art of this period found in Florence is without a great deal of merit. In fact, it is boring and repetitious. To be callous, if your thing is Baroque art, spend your Italian holiday in Rome!

I have less excuse, I guess, for spending comparatively little time with the works which are the products of non-Florentine artists of great standing. Obviously, there are some Titians, Veroneses, Giorgiones and Venezianos, as well as Rubenses and Caravaggios, in Florentine collections (especially in the ducal collection in the Galleria Palatina). With a few exceptions, better examples of the works of these artists are to be found elsewhere, for example in Venetian galleries and in the Louvre in Paris. I have noticed and mentioned some of these works, but they do not attract as much attention in this book as the works which fall within my self-imposed limits.

Throughout the book I have often anglicised the names of works and locations for ease of reference by my readers. However, some are as well, or better, known by their Italian names, and a reader wishing to learn more, for example by searching internet resources, may need the Italian names as well. I have supplied these where necessary.

While I give some information about the artists when discussing their works, I have also provided, at the end of the book, short biographies of most of the artists whose works are featured. To help keep you chronologically orientated, there is also a simplified time-line diagram.

This book is not intended as a guide to Florence itself, and so won’t substitute for a standard guidebook if you are looking for information about hotels, restaurants, shops or transport. It is a guide only to the art to be found in the city. To use it, you will need a good map of the streets of the city, with an index –these are readily available in Florence, and simplified versions can be obtained free from your hotel concierge.

Now, enjoy your visit to Florence!

Conventional Names For Traditional Religious Subjects in Renaissance Art

In the Europe of the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries, there were powerful conventions which governed the subject-matters of religious art destined for display in churches, religious houses and even in private homes. One often hears visitors to art galleries and churches comment that they are seeing the same thing over and over again, and to a certain extent, that comment is fair. It does seem, sometimes, that there are more than enough portrayals of the Madonna and Child and of Nativity scenes, for example, and it is true that one can tire of seeing St Sebastian, riddled with arrows, at the tenth exposure to him of the day.

Strangely, however, once one gets used – or perhaps a little more resigned – to the restricted subjects of religious art of the period, repetition ceases to be an annoyance and becomes a means by which one is able to make meaningful comparisons between artists, movements, styles, geographic origins and dates.

In this book, and in most academic works, conventional names are assigned to the various subjects of art. If you know what to expect when you know that a work is a Deposition, it will help you to find it on the walls quickly and certainly.

Incidentally, although in this book I refer to Mary as the Virgin, I am aware that her eternal virginity is a Marian construct dating from the fourth or fifth century. But the term the Virgin is virtually universally applied in art history, which in the context of European religious art in the twelfth to seventeenth centuries was almost exclusively Catholic and necessarily observant of Marian dogma.

Here are some of the names of subjects as conventionally used:

Adorations (also see Nativity of Christ below for Adoration of the Christ Child): If the shepherds are present, in or near the stable, and there is a heavenly host – a crowd of angels - singing in the sky (and probably some sheep on a hill in the background), the picture is an Adoration of the Shepherds. If the three Wise Men or Kings (the Magi) are present in the stable, usually magnificently apparelled and with retinues of soldiers and other hangers-on, and there is a bright star in the sky, the picture is an Adoration of the Magi.

Agony in the Garden: An Agony portrays Christ’s vigil and prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane, before his arrest. The picture shows Christ in an attitude of prayer, surrounded by His sleeping disciples. An angel approaches Him, bearing the chalice from which, metaphorically, He must choose to drink, and which signifies His torture and death.

Annunciation: An Annunciation hardly needs description, as it is one of the most popular subjects of religious art. In all cases, the Virgin is shown as a young, demurely dressed woman, seated or standing in a building, often holding or reading a book, at the moment when the Archangel Gabriel appears, kneeling before her, telling her that she has been chosen to bear the Christ. Gabriel is usually holding a white lily, or a bunch of lilies, signifying the Virgin’s purity.

Ascension: These pictures portray the risen Christ being taken up into Heaven, almost always in a cloud or nimbus and surrounded by angels, cherubs and putti (winged infants) and bright light. Watchers on the ground are usually present.

Assumption (of the Virgin): In the traditions of the Marian cult, the Virgin did not die but was assumed into Heaven by being lifted amongst (or by) angels. Assumptions often resemble Ascensions, except that the personnel are somewhat different.

Baptism of Christ: This subject shows Christ being baptized (by John the Baptist, who pours water from a vessel over Christ’s head), sometimes in a desert-like location, and often in the presence of angels. Invariably, the Holy Spirit, depicted as a white dove, descends from Heaven above the baptized Christ.

Circumcision: According to St Luke, Christ was circumcised in the Temple at the age of eight days. Portrayals of this event are fairly rare in Renaissance Art but do occur, usually as scenes forming part of a series rather than the subject of a major painting. They can be recognised by the setting (always in a temple) and the presence of a priest, usually dressed in flowing robes and wearing a tall hat. Jesus is usually held by His Mother, although occasionally he is placed on the priest’s lap. It is not very common for the operation or the instruments to be shown in detail, nor for the Child’s penis to be other than suggested. Exceptions do occur, however.

Coronation of the Virgin: In Marian tradition, after her assumption the Virgin was crowned in Heaven by her Son as Queen of Heaven (Regina Coeli), although some depictions appear to show a coronation by God the Father, and the presence of the Holy Spirit, as a dove. The picture shows the crown of Heaven being placed on Mary’s head, usually in a setting of adoration by saints and/or angels. In the fourteenth century, most depictions of the event are set in a palatial building, but in later works the event may occur in a cloud-like environment.

Crucifixion: This subject is easy to recognise, but comes in a number of different forms. The simplest is, of course, the crucifix, which is either a three-dimensional representation of Christ crucified or a two-dimensional painting of the same subject on a panel shaped as a cross (often with subsidiary pictures or decorations included at the foot and on the arms of the panel). The panel crucifix was very popular in thirteenth and fourteenth century Italy. Paintings and frescoes of the subject range from the most pared-down (with only Christ and the Cross portrayed) to more developed story-pictures, with the Virgin and others at the foot of the Cross, or showing Christ’s cross flanked by those of the Thieves. Sometimes those at the foot of the cross include saints like St Benedict or St Francis. In very large frescoes there is frequently an enormous crowd present, angels in the sky, soldiers etc. In sculpture, one sometimes sees a figure of Christ in the position of crucifixion, without the Cross actually being present. For convenience, this can also be described as a crucifix, although it is sometimes distinguished as being a corpus.

Deposition: Depositions were very popular at various times during the Renaissance, possibly because they offered painters the opportunity for the exercise of some imaginative flair without straying from the approved subject-matter. They either show the body of Christ being removed (deposed) from the Cross, usually by several muscular men wearing very little, who lower the body with strips of fabric tied to it and the arms of the Cross, while others watch from below; or the scene is that of the moment when the waiting Virgin, Magdalene and apostles first take the body of Christ in their arms, exhibiting obvious grief and distress.

Entombment: Pictures of this subject show Christ’s body being placed in the tomb. Joseph of Arimathea, who donated the burial place he had prepared for himself, is usually present, portrayed as an elderly bearded man. The Virgin is also usually present, with others. The tomb may be shown as a cave, a hole in the ground, a stone sarcophagus, or suggested by the presence of rocks in the area. Entombments vary greatly and do not follow any prescribed form.

Holy Family: The Virgin, St Joseph and infant Jesus, in various different configurations. In Florentine art, St John the Baptist, shown as a young child, may also be present. Occasionally St Anne (Mary’s mother), St Joachim (Mary’s father) or St Elizabeth (John the Baptist’s mother and Mary’s cousin) or St Zacharius (John the Baptist’s father) may be there.

Lamentation (of Christ): This is a scene in which members of Christ’s family and friends openly grieve before his dead body. The body is usually shown lying on its back on a pallet, mattress or like support, displaying all the wounds inflicted upon Christ before and during His ordeal.

Last Judgment: These pictures are self-explanatory and almost always very large (often they are frescoes). Some cover entire walls in churches or refectories. They always show Christ separating the sheep from the goats – the sinners from those who have been saved – and admitting the latter into Heaven, whilst the former are thrown into Hell and suffer horrible agonies at the hands of diabolical creatures. Artists could use their imaginations when painting such a scene, and clearly enjoyed the freedom!

Madonna and Child (in Italian, Madonna e Bambino): usually a picture of the Virgin holding infant Jesus on her knee or in her arms, with Jesus engaged with the viewer. In rare cases, the Child may be asleep or have His back to the viewer.

Madonna Enthroned (In Trono) in Glory, or Maesta: In Italian, "maesta means majesty", and this form shows Mary, enthroned as Queen of Heaven, holding the Christ Child (as an infant), surrounded by saints or angels or both. The form derives from iconic representations from Byzantine art (one will see that the portrayal is patently anachronistic).

Madonna of Humility (dell’Umilta): The Madonna, seated on the ground (occasionally on a cushion) rather than on a throne or chair, holding the Christ Child.

Madonna of the Girdle (della Cintola): There is a legend (one once very popular in Italy) that as a proof of her real presence subsequent to her assumption into Heaven, the Virgin dropped, or lowered, her belt or girdle down to St Thomas (Doubting Thomas), who may have been in India at the time of the Assumption itself and so was not present to see it for himself. The relic of the supposed girdle is kept in the Cathedral at Prato. In some cases, the episode is shown pictorially, with Thomas being present in the painting and reaching to take the girdle. However, many representations simply show the Virgin (usually crowned) holding one end of the girdle in her hand.

Madonna of the Milk (in Italian, Madonna del Latte): The Virgin has her breast exposed and is offering it to the Child.

Mocking of Christ: There are one or two striking frescoes by Fra (Beato) Angelico in the Dormitorio of the Museo di San Marco which show the figure of Christ on the way to His execution while disembodied hands and faces surround Him, bearing sticks or emitting insults. The same subject matter had led other artists to paint scenes of Christ, wearing the Crown of