Description
The Uffizi Gallery is Florence's great art museum, on the Arno next to Palazzo Vecchio: from the Middle Ages to the 1700s, with the most important collection of Florentine Renaissance painting, from Giotto to Botticelli, from Leonardo to Michelangelo.
The rooms are arranged by school and style, in chronological order, and simply following them shows you how art changes: from medieval gold backgrounds to perspective, all the way to Caravaggio and the 1600s. The core comes from the Medici collections, enriched over the centuries by bequests, exchanges and donations.
The most anticipated room is Botticelli's, with the Primavera and the Birth of Venus. They are the first great works on a secular subject of the Italian Renaissance, painted in the 1480s. Here you will also find the Portinari Triptych, Flemish, which came from Bruges in 1483.
In Leonardo's room are his beginnings: the Baptism of Christ by his master Verrocchio, where the young Leonardo painted the head of the angel on the left, and the Annunciation. Further on is Michelangelo's Doni Tondo, from 1504, among the most innovative in composition and color.
The Tribuna is a small octagonal room with scarlet red velvet walls and a dome encrusted with shells and mother-of-pearl. Francis I had it made in 1584 for the most precious pieces of the Medici collections, including the Medici Venus, a Greek original.
At the end of the route come the rooms of Caravaggio and his followers: the disenchantedly realistic Bacchus, and the Medusa. Then the Sacrifice of Isaac, and Artemisia Gentileschi's Judith.
The name promises nothing special: Uffizi simply means "offices." In 1560 Duke Cosimo I wanted to gather the thirteen most important magistracies of the Medici state here, next to Palazzo Vecchio and under his watchful eye. He entrusted the project to Giorgio Vasari.
In 1581 his son Francis I closed off the top-floor loggia and set up his collection there: paintings, ancient statues, cameos, armor, scientific instruments. That is how the Uffizi became one of Europe's oldest museums.
In 1737 the dynasty died out. The last heir, Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, ceded the collections to the House of Lorraine on condition that they stay in Florence forever. In 1769 the Gallery opened to the public.
Don't miss
• Botticelli's room.
• The Tribuna.
• Michelangelo's Doni Tondo.
• The Baptism of Christ by Verrocchio and Leonardo.
• Caravaggio's Bacchus and Medusa.
Did you know?
• The Primavera and the Venus were not painted for Lorenzo the Magnificent, but for a cousin of his with whom he was on bad terms.
• Caravaggio's Medusa is actually a wooden shield, made for tournaments and ceremonies.
• The palace is shaped like a big U: the courtyard between the two wings opens in perspective toward Piazza della Signoria and perfectly frames Palazzo Vecchio and its tower.
The rooms are arranged by school and style, in chronological order, and simply following them shows you how art changes: from medieval gold backgrounds to perspective, all the way to Caravaggio and the 1600s. The core comes from the Medici collections, enriched over the centuries by bequests, exchanges and donations.
The most anticipated room is Botticelli's, with the Primavera and the Birth of Venus. They are the first great works on a secular subject of the Italian Renaissance, painted in the 1480s. Here you will also find the Portinari Triptych, Flemish, which came from Bruges in 1483.
In Leonardo's room are his beginnings: the Baptism of Christ by his master Verrocchio, where the young Leonardo painted the head of the angel on the left, and the Annunciation. Further on is Michelangelo's Doni Tondo, from 1504, among the most innovative in composition and color.
The Tribuna is a small octagonal room with scarlet red velvet walls and a dome encrusted with shells and mother-of-pearl. Francis I had it made in 1584 for the most precious pieces of the Medici collections, including the Medici Venus, a Greek original.
At the end of the route come the rooms of Caravaggio and his followers: the disenchantedly realistic Bacchus, and the Medusa. Then the Sacrifice of Isaac, and Artemisia Gentileschi's Judith.
The name promises nothing special: Uffizi simply means "offices." In 1560 Duke Cosimo I wanted to gather the thirteen most important magistracies of the Medici state here, next to Palazzo Vecchio and under his watchful eye. He entrusted the project to Giorgio Vasari.
In 1581 his son Francis I closed off the top-floor loggia and set up his collection there: paintings, ancient statues, cameos, armor, scientific instruments. That is how the Uffizi became one of Europe's oldest museums.
In 1737 the dynasty died out. The last heir, Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici, ceded the collections to the House of Lorraine on condition that they stay in Florence forever. In 1769 the Gallery opened to the public.
Don't miss
• Botticelli's room.
• The Tribuna.
• Michelangelo's Doni Tondo.
• The Baptism of Christ by Verrocchio and Leonardo.
• Caravaggio's Bacchus and Medusa.
Did you know?
• The Primavera and the Venus were not painted for Lorenzo the Magnificent, but for a cousin of his with whom he was on bad terms.
• Caravaggio's Medusa is actually a wooden shield, made for tournaments and ceremonies.
• The palace is shaped like a big U: the courtyard between the two wings opens in perspective toward Piazza della Signoria and perfectly frames Palazzo Vecchio and its tower.