Florence Sky – not only in arts – I

Florence Sky – not only in arts – I

The giganormous Florentine heritage includes some very special takes of sky and landscapes.

In a way, a trip to Florence is a time travel which brings you back to some momentous episodes of the history of arts.

In this post we get deeper into a couple of Uffizi’s masterpieces, a Florentine indeed starred sky, and an observatory with a long history.

Florence Sky at Uffizi

Gentile da Fabriano, Adoration of the Magi

If you think that “Medieval art” and “realism” can’t even stay in the same phrase, well: think again!

Gentile da Fabriano (around 1370-1427) developed a great attention for naturalistic details in his work. In painting flowers, for example.

But his Adorazione dei Magi – Adoration of the Magi goes much further than that.

The painting is a pure beauty. The Three Kings attire gives a glimpse of the sumptuousness of noble people in the Middle Ages (after all, Palla Strozzi, the patron of the work, was in 1423 the richest man in Florence…).

But take a look at the predella too: both the Nativity and Flight into Egypt scenes have a realistic, beautiful sky!

Piero della Francesca, The Duke and Duchess of Urbino

Piero’s Diptych – double portrait is 1465 / 1472 painting is another famous and beautiful work, one of the highest peaks of the Uffizi Collection.

Actually, it’s a “double – double” painting: the portraits of Federico da Montefeltro and his wife, Battista Sforza, and the respective “triumphs”.

Piero is one of the masters of Renaissance perspective, but this four – scenes painting has something unique and very intriguing: the two portraits and the two triumphes are combined, giving a 360 degrees view of the landscape and sky around the Urbino Ducal Palace! Something like: Piero della Francesca got there more than 500 years earlier than Facebook… 😉

Enough for now: more about Florence sky in the next post!