A Baroque Itinerary in Florence

The complex of San Firenze with its spectacular façade is one of the most important examples of baroque architecture in town. In 1640 the Philippine Fathers received as a gift this area that took its name from the church of San Firenze, deriving from a mispronunciation of an earlier construction dedicated to San Fiorenzo, and built a large complex dedicated to San Filippo Neri, founder of the order who was canonized in 1622 and who was active in the Counter Reformation. The particularly ambitious project lasted many years and saw the interventions of Pietro da Cortona, Pier Francesco Silvani, Ferdinando Ruggieri and Zanobi del Rosso.The strong stone facade, with the Serragli family coat of arms (the order's main benefactors) is a sort of backdrop to the square. The church, on the left of the complex, has a rich interior designed according to a unified design and decorated with works by the main Florentine artists of the seventeenth-eighteenth centuries. Telling episodes from San Filippo Neri’s life. On the right, instead, the Music Room; inside, the choirs in the exedras and along the side walls recalling the original function of this room dedicated mainly to music and singing of lauds (according to the precepts of St. Philip Neri music was to play a fundamental role in the liturgy, and not only). Until 2012 it hosted the Court, while now it is home to numerous institutions, including the Museum dedicated to the great film director Franco Zeffirelli.

The splendid Medici Riccardi Palace, designed by Michelozzo as a Medici residence, houses, besides the famous Cavalcade of the Magi by Benozzo Gozzoli ( an authentic jewel of Florentine Baroque art), the Gallery (or "Hall of Mirrors") by Luca Giordano. The Galleria on the first floor decorated with splendid gilded stucco and painted mirrors has large bright windows on the south side and is renowned for for the great ceiling painted by Luca Giordano between 1863 and 1685 (nicknamed "Luca Fapresto" for the proverbial speed of execution ); during the same period the Neapolitan painter also frescoed the Corsini Chapel in the church of Santa Maria del Carmine, another Baroque jewel. The complex iconographic cycle, commissioned by The Riccardi family, includes a series of frescoes (eight mythological episodes alternating cardinal virtues and vices), culminating in the centre of the ceiling with the scene depicting Jupiter and the Apotheosis of the Medici, protectors of the Riccardi family. Palazzo Medici Riccardi was sold in the mid-seventeenth century by Grand Duke Ferdinando II to the Riccardi’s , bankers linked to the Medici, that gave them the title of Marquis.

One of the most important examples of Baroque in Florence is situated in piazza Antinori , a continuation of via de' Tornabuoni. In 1592 it was granted the friars Teatini (one of the new orders protagonists of the counter- Reformation) who matched the name of San Michele name to the one of San Gaetano di Thiene, founder of the Order. This admirable work of architecture, built, furnished and decorated over almost one hundred years between 1604 and 1701 is a showcase of sacred art history of 17th Century in Florence. The façade, made of typical Florentine limestone (the so called “pietra forte”) in contrast to the white statues standing out represented an innovation to what Florentines were used to. Its staircase situated in the square, with its typically Roman exalts its grandeur. Matteo Nigetti, a man of sober character and one of Florence’s leading baroque architects, superintended the works up till the completion of the transept and the choir in 1633 when he was succeeded by the court architect Gherardo Silvani. The harmonious interior which has remained intact is in the shape of a Latin cross with a single nave and three side chapels preserves, beside The Martyrdom of San Lorenzo by Pietro da Cortona, one of the rarest Florentine Baroque sculpture cycles composed of Apostles and Evangelists, of considerable size and marble panels with scenes from their lives situated inside the niches below.

Another unmissable jewel of the Baroque period – situated inside the most important painting collection of Florence (the Palatine Galleery of Palazzo Pitti) - is the series of rooms frescoed by Pietro da Cortona in Palazzo Pitti. Pietro Berrettni da Cortona, one of the most appreciated painters of that time, was called by the Grand Duke Ferdinando II de’ Medici and charged to decorate a series of representative rooms of the Medici residence. The iconographic cycle was conceived to illustrate the different steps of moral and political education of an ideal prince, supported by the Gods of Olympus (also representing the Ptolemaic planets) and his hero and alter ego Hercules. After having passed the initial test of the Stove Room (with the splendid Four Ages of Man) the painter continued with the frescoes in the other rooms, richly decorated with gildings, mirrors and stuccoes realized by a series of valuable collaborators. In the ante-room ot the court is represented the adolescence (under the sign of Venus): the room destined to nobility si dedicated to scholar youth (under the sign of Apollo): the ante-room of ambassadors represents the art of command and war (Mars); the throne room is inspired by maturity, under the sign of absolute power (Jupiter) . The ideal path ends with the private audience chamber, under the sign of Saturn, with the acheaving of wisdom that leads the Prince to the eternity of fame.

This great environment is situated next to the New Sacristy by Michelangelo, characterized by an imposing and sumptuous scenic effect: it is the mausoleum of the Medici Dinasty sought by Cosimo I and realized starting from 1604 by Matteo Nigetti, based on the design of Don Giovanni de’ Medici and Bernardo Buontalenti. Although mainly Baroque in style decorations (completed only the 20th century) are characterized by inlays of precious materials (porphyr, granite, mother-pearl, lapis lazuli) better known as "Commesso Fiorentino ", for which the famous Opificio delle Pietre Dure was founded.The funeral monuments dedicated to the Medici Grand Dukes are set along the walls of the octagonal room, among the coats of arms of the pro-Medici Tuscan cities. – The only ones which were completed by Pietro Tacca (1626-42) are those of Ferdinand I and Cosimo II, with their colossal statues overloed by the high dome (59 metres), the second large Florentine skyline after that of Brunelleschi. Behind the altar there is a small room where other precious reliquaries, donated to the city by Leo X, are displayed

The interior of the ancient Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata (founded in 1250 by the Servants of Mary) appears in contrast to the sober little cloister of vows at the entrance: it is a sumptuous profusion of gilding, paintings, stuccoes, marbles, conceived in a unified manner in the second half of the 17th century, and is one of the greatest examples of Florentine Baroque. The wide nave, with communicating side chapels, is surmounted by a rich ceiling decorated by Volterrano, one of the protagonists of Florentine painting of the seventeenth century; the frescoes in the dome (1680-83), depicting a crowded Assumption of Virgin Mary, are also by the same artist. Also the renaissance Michelozzi's small temple, where the venerated fresco of Virgin Annunziata (finished by divine hand, according to legend) is kept on the counter-façade, underwent important interventions in the 17th century, such as the crowning of the wooden cusp. The numerous chapels, which run both along the wide nave and around the Albertian tribune, preserve works by the best Florentine artists of the seventeenth century (Nigetti, Foggini, Ulivelli, Dandini, Cecco Bravo).

The Church of Carmine, which also houses the Brancacci Chapel (a manifesto of Renaissance painting, with frescoes by Masaccio) also houses the Corsini Chapel, located on the head of the left transept. This sumptuous room - dedicated to Saint Andrea Corsini, who lived in the 14th century and was canonized in 1629 - is a jewel of Florentine Baroque, also for the unity of the whole due to t greatest artists working in Florence in the second half of the 17th century (the works were completed in 1683). The cycle of sculptures by Giovan Battista Foggini is a masterpiece: three monumental altars, framed by majestic red marble columns from Seravezza, are decorated with magnificent, crowded high reliefs depicting episodes of the Saint’s life. As soon as he returned from Rome, where he had formed upon the request of Graduca Cosimo III, Foggini introduced the Baroque in Florence into this chapel, definitively freeing himself from the Mannerism of the school of Giambologna. Even the architectural design of the chapel, by Pier Francesco Silvani, was influenced by contemporary Roman influences. Another great Baroque artist is present in this chapel: Luca Giordano, to whom we owe the frescoes in the dome with the Glory of St. Andrea, executed shortly before those in Palazzo Medici Riccardi.

The church of Ognissanti, of ancient origins, was completely renovated in the seventeenth century, starting from the unmistakable facade, made of pietra serena, in the sober Florentine Baroque style by Matteo Nigetti. (1637) . It represents a characteristic element of the elegant square overlooking the Arno river. The interior, particularly rich, is decorated with altars, paintings and sculptures made mainly during the seventeenth century. The ancient choir was destroyed and replaced by the high altar made of semi-precious stones, designed by Jacopo Ligozzi, to whom we also owe the frescoes depicting the life of St. Francesco, in the cloister.