Marino Marini Museum - Ex Church of San Pancrazio

The Marino Marini Museum in Florence is located in Piazza San Pancrazio, in the former church of San Pancrazio. Marino Marini (1901-1980) was one of the most important Italian artists of the twentieth century, especially as a sculptor. He was born in Pistoia but studied art in Florence, before moving to Monza as a teacher and finally arriving at the prestigious Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan. Here, the second largest collection of his works is preserved, after the collection dedicated to him in his hometown. The Marino Marini Museum was born from the dual intention of the Florentine administration to repurpose the ancient church of San Pancrazio for cultural activities and to find an appropriate venue for the rich collection of the Pistoian master, donated to the city of Florence in 1980. Restoration work on the ancient church, rebuilt in the eighteenth century and deconsecrated at the beginning of the nineteenth century for civil purposes, which had profoundly changed its appearance, began in 1982 and was completed in 1986. Architects Lorenzo Papi and Bruno Sacchi, commissioned to draft the recovery and repurposing project for the complex, were inspired by a "dynamic" interpretation of Marini's sculptural work, enlivened by pathways and diverse levels, and a desire for dialogue between historical pre-existences and contemporary materials. The complex designed by the two architects is strongly characterized by the rich articulation of the pathways and the relationship between the existing walls and the contemporary and autonomous additions in materials and functions. The entrance of the new museum, behind the façade with columns, features a transparent back wall with an articulated layout, marked horizontally by a belt course of exposed concrete, which contrasts with the vertical continuity of the neoclassical pronaos. This transparent façade allows for a complete introspection of the museum's internal space even from the square, enabling the viewer to grasp the entirety of the sculptural works on the ground floor and the entire longitudinal development of the building, whose "apse" is significantly transparent like the diaphragm of the second façade. Once you pass through the entrance, a modest hall symmetrically flanked by the ticket office and coat check leads seamlessly to the ground floor of the museum. The large hall on the ground floor houses Marini's sculptures, freely distributed to mark the longitudinal axis of penetration and purposely directed towards the major work, both in artistic value and dimensions, of the collection: the large bronze Knight, 6 meters tall. The placement of this work effectively conditioned and determined many of the design choices; located at the center of the ancient presbytery, the sculpture is overshadowed by the dome and illuminated by the transparent wall of the apse. The explosion of this full-height space is prepared and emphasized by the design of the room, where the designers decided to retain the massive bolted beams from the nineteenth-century transformation supporting the new floor, thus opposing horizontality and verticality, weight and transparency. The two arms of the transept lead respectively, the northern one to the stairs leading to the crypt and balconies, and the southern one (at a higher level) to the former chapels, converted into sculpture rooms, services, offices, and stairs leading to the first-level balconies. The theme of the balconies is undoubtedly one of the most interesting aspects of the project and is closely linked to the dynamic kinetic enjoyment of Marini's works, particularly the sculpture of the Knight. The walkways actually develop on four different levels; the two mezzanine levels (the higher and more rigid one being that of the gallery, split and energized the other) after allowing views of the works from above, connect on the opposite side corresponding to the small room that hosts small sculptures and portraits; this overlooks the inside of the pronaos at the facade and presents a free articulation of the floor, characterized in the center by a skylight that connects the 3 levels of the museum and on the left side by a wavy profile detached from the wall, emphasizing the autonomy of the concrete structure and energizing the views into the internal space. The two main stairs located in the transept lead to the third level of the balconies, coinciding with the first floor; in this case, the path, unlike the one below, is articulated in 360 degrees, allowing the architectural space and the hosted works to be viewed from the entire perimeter of the building. A spiral staircase finally leads to the last of the four levels of the balconies, present only on the northern side, a simple straight walkway pointed at the large Knight and the transept; here too, the balustrades transform into display panels with the successful variation of elements placed against the ancient stairs of the clerestory, resolved with a structure of white iron beams, with railings and wooden displays. The sculptures of Marino Marini have rough and essential forms, and among the most recurring subjects are the Horse and knight, explored in a whole range of poses and moods, from fatigue to danger to eroticism, and Pomona, that is, the traditional rounded female figure, often pregnant, symbol of fertility since the time of the Etruscans. The almost two hundred pieces are arranged according to a thematic order that allows the visitor to approach the artist's world with freedom, made of knights, Pomonas, and portraits. The museum layout respects with great sensitivity Marini's indications in the choice of materials and natural lighting of the spaces, creating a rare effect of harmony between the container and the works. The path unfolds over multiple levels: the sculptures, in bronze and concrete, are distributed across all floors, while polychrome plasters and canvases, portraits, and drawings are located at different levels. The multiplicity of techniques employed offers further evidence of the artist's interests in the expressive possibilities of form. Among the few critical opinions found, an emblematic fact of the little interest exercised by this intervention in the Florentine environment was interesting: Carlo Pirovano, who rightly emphasized the strong restorative nature of the project, a restoration "understood not as a pure exercise of abstract recovery but as an adaptation to the new museum functionality, which aimed at restoring the readability of the monumental organism and the creation of "paths" aimed at reading Marini's works, with particular attention to the exacerbated three-dimensionality of the Pistoian artist. Exceptional, and perhaps unrepeatable in other contexts, is the possibility to "walk" around the sculpture, to admire it from continuously varying perspectives of unusual juxtapositions. [...] The entirely new intervention is therefore characterized mainly by the unfolding of a completely free path that permits the vivisection, one might say, of the fragments and memories of an ancient history and the exceptional documents of a modern and very current poetic, that of Marino, which has always been able to draw creative energy from History itself, in its supreme values of continuity and mythical realization.