Before it ended, Caterina and I decided to visit one of the most beautiful exhibitions organized in Florence at Palazzo Strozzi, Donatello’s one.
There were 130 masterpieces of the artist, which illustrate the great genius of Renaissance sculpture. It was a fascinating journey to discover his life, his style and his most important works of art.
Florence boasts several museums, where his great masterpieces are exhibited, such as the Bargello with the bronze David.
There were many works of art for each room, but we focused only on those that hid a story of the artist’s life or an anecdote related to the work itself.
By simply touching some materials that I had brought with me, she was able to understand the difference between sculptures in terracotta, marble or bronze.
Caterina listened with interest to the artist’s story, the beginning and the end of the friendship with Filippo Brunelleschi, asking me to tell him some anecdotes over and over again.
But the work of art, which struck her most, was the Madonna Pazzi, a marble sculpture, where the Virgin Mary, embracing her son, who is holding her mother’s cloak, letting her nosto brush Jesus’little one. It’s a human iconography, which highlights the intimate and loving relationship between mother and child. Their figures in relief are represented with the famous Donatello’s technique “stiacciato”, which reduces the volume of the bodies in perspective.
As soon as she saw it, she remembered when she brushed the little nose of her sister, a gesture of tenderness and kindness between the two sisters.
It was an experience to travel with the imagination and to compare the works of art with real life.
Don’t miss the chance to come and discover Donatello’s masterpieces in Florence with me!
