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JOURNAL of the FRIENDS of the UFFIZI GALLERY No Free publication on www.friendsoftheuffizigallery.org Polistampa - Firenze JOURNAL OF THE FRIENDS OF THE UFFIZI GALLERY No. 75 - August 2019 Forged in Fire On exhibit in celain, the so-called “white gold” der the Last Medici” that opens they additionally created oppor- discovered in Europe in the early in Palazzo Pitti on September 18, tunities that led to the transmis- Palazzo Pitti the Settecento that in the Age of En- 2019, sets out to offer a view of sion of metalworking techniques European dimension of lightenment became a collector’s precisely this phase of Florentine and the expansion of raw mate- bronze sculpture in craze as well as a sign of wealth art history, crucial to the magnifi- rial markets in Europe. Baroque Florence and sophisticated taste. Not in cence of the Medicean Court Today Baroque bronzes, espe- Florence at least, where even in the late Cinquecento and cially those of Florentine prov- the Porcelain Manufactory of beyond. As diplomatic gifts, enance, occupy a consistent share Doccia continued to mod- bronze sculptures deter- of the antique art market: and he Florence Dance Festi- el their creations on mined the affirma- we must not forget that the ex- Tval, an important annual hibit in Palazzo Pitti opens in the modern dance competition, same period in September as the culminates with an award XXXI International Biennial that is emblematic for Flor- Antiques Fair at Palazzo ence: the “Flying Mercu- Corsini in Florence; there ry”, a bronze copy of the without a doubt, many famous statue invented splendid examples of this by Giambologna in the genre will be on display. second half of the six- An exhibit exclusively teenth century, of which dedicated to Florentine the renowned version bronze sculpture had yet dating to 1580 is today to take place despite their in the Bargello National importance in past centu- Museum. Significantly, even ries, in recent scholarship the most talented dancers can- and in the dynamics of contem- not exactly replicate the pose of porary collecting. Consistent but the feather-light flight Mercury not comprehensive contributions is about to embark upon, defying were made during the impres- all the laws of gravity. The dance sive exhibit held at the Detroit of these bronzes is an impossible Museum in 1974, put on public and highly imaginative one that the bronze view in Florence at Palazzo Pitti only the elasticity of metal con- sculpture of with the title “The Twilight of the cedes to the fantasy of an artist, previous cen- Massimiliano Medici and the Late Baroque Art explaining in part the immense turies produced Soldani Benzi, Vase in Florence, 1670-1743”; bronzes popularity of this art form in the from cast moldings with Handles in the were again under study in the Renaissance and the Baroque pe- of the sculptures of form of Swans and outstanding exhibit on the Flo- riods. Giovanni Battista Cupids, 1690 ca., rentine Seicento curated by Mina The fashion for bronzes on a Foggini, Massi- black jasper, gilded Gregori held in Palazzo Strozzi small and medium scale gained miliano Soldani silver and bronze. in 1986. And the topic was subse- popularity in Florence in the Benzi and their Palatine Gallery, quently given space but within a Quattrocento as a revival of An- pupils Giuseppe Uffizi Galleries. much wider context dedicated to tiquity, increasing above all in the Piamontini and production in all of Europe in the late Cinquecento – once again Antonio Montauti, with Giambologna – to reach its among others. tion of Florentine taste on an peak in the Seicento. It did not The exhibit “Forged in Fire. international scale; and within a Eike D. Schmidt wane with the discovery of por- Bronze Sculpture in Florence un- vaster socio-economic network, (continued on page 2) IL GIORNALE degli UFFIZI 1 “Forged in Fire. Bronze Sculpture in Florence under the Last Medici” Curated by Eike D. Schmidt, Sandro Bellesi and Riccardo Gennaioli Treasury of the Grandukes, Palazzo Pitti, Uffizi Galleries From September 18, 2019 to January 12, 2020 much more. Thus the time is ripe play: besides preparatory draw- for an exhibit that focuses on this ings (many recently purchased by argument, offering new stimulus the Uffizi and on public view for for future studies. the first time), paintings and art Once again, visi- objects, it will be the bronzes tors will be wel- themselves - more than a hundred comed to the - that celebrate with their dancing sublime and lithe poses the creativity and the magnificent cosmopoli- tanism of Florentine taste. setting of Eike D. Schmidt Giovanni Battista Foggini, Crucifixion, bronze. Treasury of the Grandukes, Palazzo the Trea- Pitti, Uffizi Galleries. sury of the Grandukes exhibit “Von allen Seiten schön”, that widens the borders to a where the shown at the Altes Museum in European scale, multiplying glory of the Berlin in 1995-1996. personalities and opening new House of the This all took place, however, gen- perspectives on the circulation Medici frescoed erations ago. In the meanwhile, of works of art, on the figure on the walls be- scholarship has progressed with of the antique dealer, on the comes the themat- sensational discoveries and a new unsuspected mediator and ic container definition of the artistic milieu of contemporary businessmen, for a flour- Baroque Florence and beyond, on the role of models and ishing dis- Giambologna, Neptune, Pietro Tacca, 1563-1564, bronze, Museo Civico Medievale, Bologna. Equestrian Monument of Carlo Emanuele I, Duke of Savoy, bronze, Museumslandschaft Hessen Kassel. Giuseppe Piamontini, Jupiter, bronze, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Massimiliano Soldani Benzi, Urn, bronze, Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 2 IL GIORNALE degli UFFIZI A Refined Interpreter An exhibit at the patrons held his word in the Giovan Giacomo Caraglio, Uffizi presents a series of highest esteem. Portrait of Pietro Aretino with Motto, 1646-1655, burin, Department of Prints art works directly related Tracing his friendly relations (Raffaello, Giulio Romano, Se- and Drawings, Uffizi Galleries. to the life and works of bastiano del Piombo, Tiziano, Pietro Aretino, promoter Sansovino, Vasari…), his corre- and friend of the most spondence (Michelangelo) and tua of the Gonzaga, the Venice Leo X in Palazzo Vecchio and famous artists of his time commissions (Tintoretto), the of the Gritti Doge as well as the the door of the sacristy of San exhibit proposes to historically Florence of Dukes Alessandro Marco in Venice. reconstruct and to criti- and Cosimo, the Urbino of the This was not the triumph of cally review the events, Della Rovere, Perugia, Arezzo an individual alone but that the context, the mo- and Spanish Milan, without ne- of a way of living and speaking ments and the results of glecting the copious and clear about art that gave artists the a continuous discussion channels by which the word centrality that shortly thereaf- that became a veritable itself came to resound beyond ter the pages of Vasari would debate on the question Italy; for himself, certainly, but consecrate. of art that lasted with- also as support for the efforts of The works on the exhibit, all out interruption over his artist friends at the courts of intimately connected to the life forty years from the Francis I and, above all, Charles of the writer, are proof that art end of the first decade V and Philip II. found in him not only a refined of the Cinquecento to Therefore, not by chance Pie- interpreter but also a promoter the mid-1550s. This tro’s likeness is one of the most of great effectiveness; this means took place in precisely frequently reproduced at the that for us that same word can those places that then time – made known to all in the become a key of interpretation and from thereafter paintings of Sebastiano and Tiz- that guarantees a more intricate have always embodied iano, in the prints of Raimondi understanding of both that art Sebastiano Luciani, called Sebastiano del Piombo, the very idea of the Re- and Caraglio, in the reliefs of and that world. Portrait of a Lady, 1512, Gallery of Statues and naissance: the Rome of Sansovino and Leone Leoni. Paintings, Uffizi Galleries. Agostino Chigi and the And his image appears again Paolo Procaccioli Medici popes, the Man- in public places like the Hall of or the modern visitor, an Fexhibit on Renaissance art centered on a writer like Pietro Aretino might seem a “Pietro Aretino surprising initiative, even a provocation. Especially when and the Art the individual in question is a controversial figure first of the censured by the Index and subsequently by the judg- Renaissance” ment of moralists, and thus spurned for centuries. What we are proposing here, on Curated by the other hand, would have Anna Bisceglia, been a most obvious choice Matteo Ceriana for Aretino’s contemporaries. Then in fact everyone knew and Paolo Procaccioli that the writer’s home was the meeting place for the most Magliabechiana renowned artists and that those same artists and their Hall, Uffizi Galleries From November 27, Tiziano Vecellio, Portrait of Pietro Aretino, 1545, 2019 to March 1, 2020 Palatine Gallery, Uffizi Galleries. IL GIORNALE degli UFFIZI 3 A Domestic Environment Retracing the history occasion and completed with Cosimo II) took his first steps. of the renowned Vasari a rapidity that doesn’t shy in The everyday use of the cor- comparison to ephemeral archi- ridor is also confirmed by the Francesca Funis Corridor, we learn about tectural apparatus. installation of a “bath” in 1598: a its everyday family use on Documentary evidence brings small private thermal chamber, the part of the Grandukes. to light the domestic use and located along the passage in Il Corridoio This is where Cosimo II the family atmosphere that correspondence to the archway learned to walk filled the air of the corridor: over via de’ Bardi, destroyed Vasariano: not just a mere connector but in 1944.
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