9/27 Friday
The Galleria dell’Accademia is the home of Michaelangelo’s David, and the lines are almost as crazy as at the
Uffizi, but we’re line-savvy by now, so we walk in with our pre-paid tickets.
The other features of the museum are often neglected, but we find some really
interesting exhibits as we walk through the halls.
The museum has a collection of fine
musical instruments from the Medici Court, including some Stradivarius violins.
There’s a dulcimer made of marble, usually blockaded by a tour leader, and some
beautiful wind instruments. Another room is full of plaster models used to
create the final marble statues. It is inelegantly displayed, statuettes and
busts all piled in, without labels, but it is interesting to see the background
materials of sculpture. The plaster pieces are lined with small holes used for
measuring instruments to scale up the work to the marble. This is the sort of
stuff that is often not kept or shown. In another exhibition area, there is a
video showing the techniques used to create the medieval gold-leaf altarpieces
of Giotto, from building the wood panels to embossing the golden halos. It
makes you appreciate the works even more.
When you enter the hallowed hall
that houses the David, there are four massive, unfinished works by
Michelangelo, known as the Slaves, or Prisoners. You can follow his method of
sculpting by looking at the different stages of completeness in the four works.
To the modern eye, they look finished, figures emerging from the stone,
breaking free. We learn that the works were commissioned, but the order was
cancelled before they were completed. So they were left undone. We don’t think
of Michelangelo as a contract sculptor today. You’d rather think that he would
finish the works just for the sake of his art. It gives some insight into the
realities of the artists’ life at the time.
The statue of David is so iconic,
seeing might seem redundant in a way, but it’s not. The statue is beautifully
presented, the light is perfect, the crowds subdued, and everything about it is
just right.
So, after sitting quietly in the hall for a
while, we head over across the Ponte Vecchio to scope out the Pitti Palace. We
decide to save it for a full day, and go around the block to the Museum of Natural History,
the Specola, the oldest scientific museum in Europe.
This museum is in a former palace
building, entered through a quiet court of great arched hallways, up a massive
stone stairway. I’d say anytime you need to escape from throngs of tourists,
the Natural History Museum of Wherever You Are is a good bet.
The museum has a fairly typical
collection of animals specimens in big glass cabinets. The gazelles are set
right next to the lions and tigers, probably upsetting both parties. It’s an
interesting visit, because we like this sort of thing, but the real attraction
is something different.
The museum has a collection of
anatomical models from the late 1700’s which are just amazing. They are done in
wax, incredibly realistically, for the purpose of medical instruction. This was
in the days before refrigeration of course, and cadavers were only so useful.
Some of the models are full figures: a woman lying delicately posed on the
table, her long hair draped over her shoulder, her chest spayed open to reveal
her lungs and spleen and whatnot. Others are just pieces, some enlarged for
clarity, describing brains and spines and intestines and bladders, showing
every capillary and nerve. So much fun!
1 Video Included
Florence Accademia Gallery
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