More Florence

May 5, 2007

Florence, Italy

The past two days have been another few wonderful ones in the city of Florence. I have done a lot of walking around, and seeing the city—this place is filled to the brim with all kinds of art and architecture, and I loved wandering around and seeing the sights. I could definitely come back here, if I had the time. Yesterday we got to see one of the most famous works in all of art history, Michelangelo’s David, and later got to see an exhibition of Cezanne and other impressionists working in Florence, and then the Brancacci chapel, with the famous Massaccio frescoes. Today was just as good—a trip to the top of the Duomo, and then a 2 hour tour around the Uffizi gallery, followed by the best dinner ever. The trip is finally winding down, and I love the opportunity to see anything other than the classical period.

But, as a last hurrah, we went to the archaeological museum in Florence, a vast building of neoclassical type with a new addition in glass and steel added in, and elsewhere, tall rooms filled with classical statuary and one of the most famous vases in the Greek world: the Francois vase, famous for the multitude of scenes and complexity of its iconography. It also had one of the largest collections of Egyptian art, something that we have not really seen much of for the past few months, but I was delighted to experience again. I put my iPod on and wandered through the galleries—stopping and looking at the objects I found interesting—one sign in particular outlined the influence of Egyptian architecture on the rest of the world and I was pleased and surprised to discover that we had visited almost all of them. The Great Pyramid, the pyramid of Cestius, the obelisks erected by Thuthmose III and the one in Istanbul, and another smaller pyramid on a local grave marker were all places that I now had in my personal photo album. I got Sam and we both stopped and stared. It’s a huge testament to how far we have traveled on this trip, to be able to look in a museum at the dissemination of an ancient culture and to be able to say that we have visited all of those places. We walked into room after room filled with pottery shards, by now able to easily identify what type and time period, and places filled with bronze statues of boys, busts of heads, and a curious mythological beast with a lion’s body, the tail of a snake, and a head of a goat sticking out of the middle of its back.

Then, it was on to the big event of the day, a visit to the academy, a small but very important museum that held Michelangelo’s David. After walking through what looked like some very high tech airport-type security, we were allowed to enter the museum. The front rooms just contained some minor pieces, and as we moved along we encountered some other lovely works—the Prisoners that Michelangelo had originally carved to go with a larger tomb dedication to one of the Medicis, I think, but was left unfinished in his studio. There are four of them—over lifesize bodies just beginning to pulsate with life, emerging out of the rock face, heads and limbs still enveloped but twisting and turning, trying to get free. Michelangelo is quoted with saying something along the lines of “the sculpture is already in the stone, it is my job to free it,” and here we saw exactly what he meant. I also enjoyed the opportunity, much like when I saw the unfinished work by Da Vinci in the Vatican museum, to see the process of the artist. Michelangelo clearly looked like he worked from the torso outward, creating the major thrust of the bodies’ core before moving outward to the limbs and the head, which still remained encased in their stony holds. And then rounding the corner, I saw him, the David, standing in his own niche, lit from a strong overhead light.

He was absolutely magnificent, larger than life and far more beautiful than I had imagined. I walked closer and all around the outside, admiring Michelangelo’s ability to perfectly capture the body, down to the veins that snaked their way around his free hand, which fell in a powerful curve againt his thigh. The other hand rose up to cradle the sling, which trailed down his back and came to rest in the curved hand. He looked off into the distance, a more contemplative figure, made even more significant by the complete lack of a goliath head, which had been the standard for the other figures created by Donatello and others. We all were in a state of shock. Chris Beeston and Ambrice immediately set down to sketch him, but I stayed up, walking slowly around him over and over again, before moving on to see some more of the gallery, which contained some large Renaissance paintings by De Sarto, who I am beginning to see everywhere, and others like Bronzino.

But the David was the true tour de force, and we could not help but be drawn back to him, turning and moving around him in slow circles.

After exiting the museum, Ambrice, Jess Bradshaw and I decided to walk over to another art exhibit we had seen advertised all over billboards in Florence. It was called Cezanne a Firenze, and it was an exhibition containing the works of Cezanne and a number of other impressionists including Mary Cassatt, John Singer Sargeant, and a few other Italian sounding artists who I had not heard of. I really enjoyed the change of scenery, walking around and watching Cezannes development as an artist, how the changes in location and in the surrounding people in his life affected his work. We took our time, walking through the rather modern looking Palazzo Strozzi, where the exhibition was housed, which looked like many of the other buildings in a neoclassical style, but inside was completely white walled and lit from above by acerbic looking florescent lights on their tracks.

It was so different—a step away from the studied realism of the Renaissance, the overblown color and drapery and figures of the Baroque, away from the faded frescoes of the Roman period, and into a world where the women sat in drawing rooms and played pianos, and where the men wore top hats and smoked cigars all day. The shapes were not outlined, but blocked in flowing movements of color—light and color, dancing on the picture plane. I know very little about this period in art history myself, and reading the plaques on the walls next to the paintings gave me only a little bit of a taste for what was going on during the impressionist movement. I wanted to know more, but for now I settled with looking and absorbing the art before me.

Jess Bradshaw elected to return to the hotel after the end of the exhibition, but I had talked to Toumazou earlier that day for suggestions as to what to see in Florence, and he had strongly recommended that we go to the Brancacci chapel to see the famous frescoes by Massaccio of the stories of St Peter. So Ambrice and I, in spite of the rain, ventured out of the museum and across the Ponte Vecchio. We ambled along the river, crowded with its warren of warm colored houses with their red tiled roofs, and made our way along the streets until we reached the bridge. The Ponte Vecchio is filled with shops—it looks more like a regular street than anything else, except at breaks in the building we could look over the railings and see the river Arno stretching in either direction beside us. It was really cool.

Crossing over to the other side of the river, we entered an area with tons of crowded streets, the houses projecting out over the road to crowd the sky above, and provide us with a little bit of shelter from the drizzle that seemed never-ending. We walked and walked, moving farther away from the river as we went, until we came to a small square with a rather rudimentary looking church—rough brick faced and small, barely rising out of the small buildings that surrounded it. But, to the side, we saw the sign for the chapel itself—the Brancacci chapel. We entered and realized that, like many of the churches in Florence, we had to pay a small fee to enter the building. Since neither of us had any cash, and like many of the places in Europe, this place did not accept a credit card, we asked for directions to the nearest bank and ventured out again into the grey drizzle.

The streets were not conducive to finding a bank. We had to stop at almost every intersection and ask again where we could find a banca and every Florentine would cock his head quizzically at us before vaguely pointing us in the right direction. It took us about 30 minutes, but eventually we found it, withdrew our money, and wound our way back through the narrow streets again to reach the chapel.

It was worth it. We entered the sanctuary through a small door that led to a colonnaded courtyard, arches of grey stone parading around in a small square. Then we moved into a side building and entered the church itself. The rest of the church stood, dimly lit by the natural light of the stormy day, with baroque looking volutes and decoration soaring up to the ceilings, which contained frescoes of illusionistic architecture and flying cherubims. But behind us, on the wall that we had just entered through, was the object of our journey—brightly lit, the frescoes adorned the walls of a small chapel, winding their story around. We stepped closer to examine them carefully, and then stepped back to grasp the whole scene—the edges of the fresco contained the famous scenes of the expulsion of the garden, gestures and poses that would later be copied by another Florentine artist, Michelangelo.

Adam and Eve occupy a small space in the entrance of the chapel, but they are no less powerful. An angel in a brightly colored cloak follows the shout lines of an angry God, driving the pair out of the garden of Eden. Adam hunches over, his back in a sad curve, and buries his face in his hands, ashamed, while Eden covers herself with her hands and uplifts her face in desperation and shame. I stood there, unbelieving, and Ambrice immediately whipped out her sketchbook to record the great works before us. I did a slow turn, and examined the other scenes one by one, and saw how the colors were still fairly bright after so many years, the folds of the cloth were beginning to take volume, and the artist was grappling with perspective. I could see the lines where the freco secco had been opened for work—small portions for the complicated details of the human face, and larger ones where the body and clothes were located. One of my most favorite scenes, and one that I had not seen in my art history books, was one showing a scene of baptism. Figures knelt in positions of supplication as the water was poured over their heads, a delicate moment and one excecuted, once again, with magnificent skill.

Ambrice and I spent a good hour there, walking around, drawing, and looking at the wonderful piece of art work before us, but we were starting to get hungry. So, we left the chapel and on the way out caught a short movie telling us the history of the chapel and the church itself, the frescoes of Massaccio had miraculously survived a horrendous fire, one which consumed much of the rest of the church. And then, we tramped off into the darkening evening, trying to keep our feet out of the puddles.

Dinner that night was another picinic, taken on Sam’s room with its nice balcony, and we all hung out and drank some wine afterwards. Everyone is really ready to be done with all of the traveling, and folks are starting to speak of home so often. I personally am ready to be in control of my life again—being told when to wake up and where to go every day gets so tedious.

Today was another wonderful day in the city. I finally got to go inside the Duomo, and we went to another great museum—the Uffizi gallery, home to some of Bottecelli’s great works, and had a magnificent dinner. Not a bad way to end the stay in Italy.

The morning started off early, even though we were not meeting as a group until much later in the day. The Uffizi gallery is such a prominent feature in Florence that to get into the museum reservations have to be bought in adavance, and at a very high price. Toumazou had made reservations as late as possible, and we were squeezed into the latest time of the day. Still, I was grateful to go, and I wanted to see as much as possible of Florence before I had to leave. The city is too beautiful to waste the morning sleeping in.

So, Ambrice and I decided to wake up early, and go to see the Duomo, and also possibly to go to another art gallery I had identified in the city. Across the Arno, the Pittu palace held a large private collection acquired by another one of Florence’s huge wealthy merchant families. They had two Caravaggios in their collection, and a number of works by Titian that I wanted to see. I also had to go to the leather market—the jacket I had bought a few days ago had a snap break, and I wanted it fixed before I left the city.

So, after having a little breakfast and a large amount of coffee to jumpstart the day, we were off, into the just-barely-awake city. We arrived at the market just as the vendors were opening up and uncovering the stalls, and I luckily recognized the same man who had so painstakingly fitted my jacket. He remembered me, luckily, and when I told him about the problems with my jacket he immediately offered to fix it for me that day, free of charge. I gave him the jacket and he promised it would be ready by noon.

So Ambrice and I made the short walk over to the Piazza del Duomo, arriving before any of the tourists had shown up. The doors of the church itself weren’t even open yet, but deciding that going to the top of the Duomo was a must-do, we decided to camp outside the doors and wait. A few minutes later Angela and Catherine, two other girls from the trip, just randomly walked up to the doors—they had the same idea we did, and wanted to get as early a start on the day as possible. As it turned out, the four of us were some of the first ones to get inside the building when it opened 40 minutes later.

I stepped inside, and was immediately awed and overwhelmed at how TALL the building seemed. The inside was a stark contrast to the marble encrusted and heavily sculptured outside; almost bare walls of grey stone rode the arched vaulting all of the way up to the roof, pitched and crisscrossed with the ribs of stone. There were virtually no horizontal lines in the whole interior—everything was concentrated in one great big thrust upward, meeting high overhead and making all of us feel remarkably insignificant. The wall over the entranceway contained a gigantic clock, designed by a Renaissance artist, with huge gold roman numerals aligned around a massive dial, decorated with frescoes in the frame. The windows were filled with stained glass, and echoed the upward movement of the rest of the structure—narrow oceans of light filled with color. I got such a tranquil, calm awe out of the whole experience of the building—the austerity of the walls and the soaring height, broken by splashes of glowing color—it was all so beautiful I could have stayed in there all afternoon.

We wandered around the echoing cavernous space, watching as the prayer stands got filled with candles and made islands of warm glow in the cool light that filtered down. We moved underneath where the dome rose to its great height, and saw the rings of fantastic demons and flights of angels that made up the enormous fresco on the inside of the dome. It was like stepping from silence into a great opera, as the figures twisted and soared inside of the massive space, and we stood flabbergasted at the whole thing.

It was then that we ran into some other CSAers, Scott and Jess Bradshaw came up to us as we gawked at the ceiling, and told us that they were going to go to the top. This building also apparently had an internal stair between the two shells of the dome, as St Peters did, and the view of Florence was supposed to be spectacular. So Ambrice and I began the steep ascent, climbing literally about 500 stairs that wound up and up, first clockwise, then counterclockwise, growing smaller and smaller the closer that we got to the top.

The first rest we got from the endless twisting was coming out of the narrow passage and into the inside of the church, right at the rim of the dome. From there, we were within a hand’s distance of the huge frescoes that adorned the ceiling, on a tiny little walkway wide enough for one person to pass at a time. Seen from up close, the frescoes were even more impressive—broad swaths of light and dark color that from across the gaping space blended to create the shadows on muscle, or the flurry of an angel’s wings. Ambrice immediately set down to sketch a bit, and I stopped and stared, letting my eyes wander over the incredibly complicated scene. Everywhere I looked I saw something different, and could return to the same spot over and over again and continue to be fascinated. I looked over at Ambrice, and she was busily sketching away, perched in a corner of the 8 sided dome, where people could more easily pass—and right next to her was a young guy who looked like he was about to do the same. He stopped and reached into his backpack, and pulled out a book, and started to thumb through the pages. I expected to see something similar to what Ambrice does—lots of figural studies, but was pleased to see what looked like architectural drawings. The thin straight lines and the use of multiple perspectives played themselves out in page after page, and I couldn’t help but stare at the kid’s work. He caught me looking, and I smiled awkwardly before bolting to the far end of the dome.

Eventually, however, I caught up with him, in his little corner, and worked up the courage to ask if he was an architecture student. It turned out that he was, just finishing up a semester with Syracuse University’s program based in Florence, a program I had actually looked into entering as a back up for the classics trip. His name was Zach, and this was his last day—he wanted to get some good drawings of the Duomo before meeting his parents and taking them on a tour. I even got a chance to look at his stuff up close, and gushed about how wonderful it was to be doing architecture in Florence. He agreed. After a few more minutes of small talk, Ambrice approached us, introduced herself, and we continued our ascent, waving goodbye to our newmade friend.

Eventually the stairs got so tight that they wound up in a perfect spiral, the bannester was unnecessary, replaced instead with a thick rope that hung down from the ceiling that we clung to for dear life as we wound around and around. And then, suddenly, we emerged out into the gray day, all of the little red roofs of Florence stretched below us.

Its not until you see the city from that perspective that you realize just how small it really is. From the perch, I could see the Arno, the Palazzo Pitti which I wanted to visit later in the day, Santa Croce, the church that I had visited with Scott, as well as the bright blue rounded dome of the synagogue. We walked around and around the lantern of the dome, crowded with the other tourists who babbled in a number of different languages all around us. We could even see down into the Piazza del Duomo itself, crowded with a multitude of umbrellas in the drizzle. I could see the markets, and the train station, and eventually we pulled out a map so that we could identify the other less identifiable stuff. It was amazing up there, the city of Florence just whirring underneath us in its tangle of streets and jagged red roofs, while we stood, above it all.

But, it was getting close to noon by then, and I still wanted to go to the other side of the Arno to see the Pitti Palace and gallery, so we began the narrow descent, reemerging on an upper level of the dome, where all of the frescoes still writhed, brightly illuminated. Since we still had a little time, Ambrice and I found a less trafficked area of the walkway and perched our sketchbooks on the rail, engrossing ourselves in Vasari’s fresco. Inspired by my architect encounter, I tried a few drawings of the inside of the building itself, and we talked and laughed as people passed us by and peered over our shoulders to see what we were up to.

And then it was a long descent, where the stairs finally spit us back out into the Piazza, and we made our way back to the markets to retrieve my jacket, good as new! We had a quick snack there, and knowing that we had to meet the professor and the rest of the group very shortly at Santa Croce, we quickly walked down, past the Duomo, and toward the river, crossing the bridge and moving straight back to an open plaza dominated by a huge palace. The day had finally cleared, and the clouds had retreated, leaving behind a clear blue sky filled with cotton-ball clouds. The palace had a lot more to it than I had thought—in addition to the galleries of Baroque and Renaissance art, there was a modern art gallery, the palace itself, evidently extravagantly decorated along the lines of the Medici, and elaborate gardens. Unfortunately, however, when we got to the ticket counter we discovered an outrageous admission price, and knowing that we would only have an hour before we would have to meet the group anyway, we decided to forego the gallery and walk along the river instead.

It was a lovely walk—the river was calm, and created imperfect reflections of the little buildings that lined the sides. Across the way, we could see the imposing walls of the Uffizi gallery rise up in their two grey wings of Baroque extravagance, and farther in the distance, the Duomo and the spires of our next destination—Santa Croce, where we would meet the group. We crossed at another of Florence’s charming bridges, this one uncluttered with shops and businesses, leaving open a clear view of the river, and the hills that rose in halcyon beauty as they met the clouds and the sky above, everything repeated again in the stillness of the water below. Two perfect worlds, with Ambrice and I enraptured in the middle.

Along the way, we passed a number of small pizzerias, and deciding that this was, after all, our last day in Florence, and that we should probably treat ourselves, we stopped in to have a lunch. We each split some white wine and had a delicious pesto pizza, basking in the sun and people watching as the Florentines went about their daily business. Then it was just a short walk to Santa Croce, which looked ten times more beautiful in the brilliant light of the afternoon than in the gloomy light of day in which Scott and I saw it. Since we still had some time, Ambrice and I busted out the sketchbooks again, rendering the façade of the building in pen and ink and oil pastels. The building looks like it is made out of the same materials as the Duomo—red, dark green, and white marble, set in panels that rise up the tripartite façade, punctured in the center by a dark rose window.

We stayed there until the group arrived, and we were given a short lecture on the church before we were freed to walk around inside. Since I had seen it before, I took my time with the inside of the church, going in all of the little chapels that stood next to the altar. One of them had a damaged fresco by a very early Renaissance artist—I am blanking on the name—that I had missed the first time around and wanted to go find again. I had also missed, in the next door cloister, a chapel designed by Brunelleschi, which I made sure to visit, and an exhibition of a bunch of gravestones, carved and inscribed with images of knights, and saints, the script growing spidery and firm as the carving techniques changed throughout time.

But we had our appointment to keep at the Uffizi, so it wasn’t long before we were ushered out of the church, and walked pell-mell through the twisty streets. We finally stopped at a grand Piazza that Ambrice and I had walked through on the previous day. It was full of statues, placed in three rows under a colonnaded gallery. These statues ranged in date from the antique to the Renaissance—a huge copy of David stood, imposing, flanking the doorway, and others surrounded him. One of them had a sculpture of the Rape of the Sabine women, two figures involved in an intense struggle over control of the female who cries from the top of the pile.

The Uffizi Gallery was a wonderful museum, and so popular that even with a reservation, we had to wait in a long line just to enter the place. But it was worth it. Not only were the long halls filled to the brim with wonderful original Greek and Roman sculpture, but the walls were filled with tons of renaissance works. The most famous of these is the Primavera and the Birth of Venus by Botteccelli. They were in a whole room filled with his works—his fine line and glowing figures lined the walls from floor to ceiling, and the whole group of us walked around the room, completely lost in the splendor. I even did some drawings—difficult because of the press of people around and the knowledge that the gallery would be closing soon, but I tried to take as long as I could to stop and appreciate what was before me every time.

Right when the gallery was about to close, I walked down the stairs and ran into an old friend—located right on the way out, in the floor below, Caravaggio’s Medusa grimaced. I had known that she was in the gallery from searching a bit the day before online, but I had figured that I had missed her in the multitude of masterpieces adorning the walls. But there she was, painted right on a round piece of wood that resembled a sort of shield, staring in her death mask. I stood and stared for as long as I could, and then saw other Caravaggios—and Caravaggio admirers such as Artemesia Gentileschi along the walls. Some of them showed dramatic scenes from bible stories—one in particular showed the beheading of Holofernes (Not sure if that’s spelled correctly), in which Judith takes a huge knife to the man’s neck, who lies screaming, his head staring right out at us.

Just as I was getting absorbed, the bell rang, indicating the closing of the museum, and I tore myself away from the wonderful pieces of art before me and walked down the stairs and out into the gradually dimming Florentine evening. I finally realized that I was hungry, and met the rest of the group on the steps. We had discovered, through Jeanna, a wonderful restaurant close by that served seven or eight all-you-can-eat traditional Italian food, and for our last hurrah we were going to go there. The reservation was for 7:30, so we waited a little bit, clutching our stomachs as they growled for food, and then walked to the restaurant where we joined the crowd at the door waiting for the restaurant to open.

The food was delicious, course after course of great steaming hot food. We started out with some lighter appetizers; priscutto and a wonderful barley and vegetable salad, similar to couscous, and salad. Then we got soup, and an option of several different kinds of delicious pasta, followed by the main event—huge plates of roasted meats of all different types. We ate so much food, and the wine was flowing freely. Everyone was really happy—we knew the trip was winding down, and we were all looking forward to home (or in my case being on our own). We found our way back to the hotel, past the Duomo, which loomed big out of the darkness, and through the dark maze of streets, passing out in our beds.

All that was left to do was to go to France, and the trip would be over.