A Shorter Day

I woke up thirty minutes before my alarm because I thought someone was touching my foot and yet I was almost late joining the group. Rough. 

The first place we went to was the Church of Saint Lawrence. But before we go into that I have to talk about the Medici family. 

The MF were a renaissance era banking and stuff sort of family. They were able to rise to the top and just really rake in the dough. Because of that, they became the most powerful family in Europe. They commissioned all of the works of art, their family members were in every government, it was incredible. 

So the family convinced the public of Florence to raise money to fix their family chapel. Kind of ridiculous, I know. Well the original church was an 11th century Romanesque church which stood on the grounds of a church from 393 CE. Every big name helped out with this building: Brunelleschi, Donatello, Michelangelo, etc. 

Even though it is meant to be a room for a priest(?) to get ready, the Medici made it a room for family members to be laid to rest. A family member’s tomb is on top of turtles, kind of like slow and steady wins the race. This whole entire tomb was made by Verrocchio, the master who taught Leonardo da Vinci. He deserves so much more recognition. 

Within the old sacristy (sacristy is a room where a priest? Puts on his robes for mass) is this beautiful dome which has constellations. The color of blue would have to be lapis lazuli and it totally would because the Medici loved showing off money (LL is very expensive).

This is a fresco called The Martrydom of Saint Lawrence by Bronzino. This is definitely a mannerist work of art. What’s super interesting is that the nudity is just about covered except for the occasional booty but because of the over muscularity it doesn’t seem like their coveted. This work of art doesn’t seem very reverent. I’ll be honest, it’s not my favorite but it is a great example of a mannerist painting. 

The dome dome in this cathedral is just beautiful. We didn’t spend any time talking about it but it’s something I wanted to share. Just a nice thing. 

This is the high altar. These images aren’t painted, they’re actually mosaics painstakingly put together. Just incredible. Just in front of the high altar is the marker which notes the resting place for a member of the Medici family. That is super unexpected and wild. Kinda full of themselves and way into the money, in my opinion. 

This is a choir loft by Donatello. He definitely did a lot of those. This includes reliefs in bronze. It sits pretty high above the heads of the congregation so it’s hard to truly appreciate it.

The next the next place we checked out was the New Sacristy because it had sculptures by Michelangelo. While the sacristy is a place for priests(?) to put on their special robes for mass, this was a funeral place for members of the Medici family. It was commissioned by the pope who was a Medici. Because he died before Michelangelo finished and every pope wants their work of art by him, it was never completed. 

It was commissioned during the later part of Mich’s life so it’s super mannerist. That means the figures are overly muscular and are in impossible poses. Mannerism was influenced by the discovery of the ancient sculpture Laocoon. In this sculpture grouping, he includes allegorical figures of day, night, dawn, and dusk. The male figures represent dayish times and the female figures represent the nightish time. 

We checked out some incredible frescoes in a monastery by Fra Angelico. Most of these works of art are in the cells of monks, or their personal quarters. I took pictures of some of the most notable works. Some include in one scene all of the events leading to Christ’s crucifixion such as the kiss of Judas and other things. The most common scene was of Christ on the Christ with his blood coming out. After spending so much time in a hotel room with three other girls, I would love some personal space in one of these small cells. 

The last thing we checked out was the library within the monastery. They had more of these choir books that looked like illuminated manuscripts. They are massive; I can’t imagine trying to hold one up in a choir! It seemed like the blue in these books comes from lapis lazuli which is a super rare color that can only be found in Afghanistan. It’s expensive so this is a super big deal. There’s good leaf in these books as well. 

After this, a few of us went to lunch then we just shopped around until we met again for class this evening. A student who got really sick back in Rome finally gave her report on the column of Trajan. I’ll have to add more just a little later. We have to pack for our Cinque Terre weekend.