«Therefore, Empoli can boast the possession of two of Masolino’s paintings»: thus in 1902 did the famous American critic, Bernard Berenson, attribute to Masolino the two masterpieces present in this Tuscan city: the Madonna with Child in the Church of Santo Stefano degli Agostiniani («the...
The Museum of the Collegiate Church of Empoli arose on a background of Risorgimento uprisings aimed at creating the Unification of Italy. Its origin dates back to 29 June 1859, when the provisional government of Tuscany awarded the Opera di Sant’Andrea a first grant of...
An entire hall of the Museum of the Collegiate Church of Sant’Andrea gathers, both in quantity and quality, the best of an important Florentine workshop of the second half of the 15th century, the Botticini family of painters active for about 40 years, as documents...
The core of the ecclesiastical furnishings displayed in the Museum of Sacred Art in Tavarnelle – apart from two exceptional 13th century crosses and some 14th-15th century exemplars – is made up for the most part by works in silver from the 18th and 19th...
The monumental sculpture group representing The Mourning over the Dead Christ, that dominates the altar of the oratory of San Francesco has recovered, after a recent and skillful restoration, the refined tones and the compositional harmony that permit reconciliating the subject’s intense dramatic spirit with...
Among the early artistic representations created in order to show and affirm Christ’s humanity, those of the Crucified, alone or surrounded either by mourners or by scenes of the Passion, had experienced a progressive diffusion beginning from the 5th century, using artistic means of various...
The hospice of San Francesco in Greve was, for centuries, a significant Franciscan settlement in the Greve area, subordinate to the larger Croce convent in San Casciano that, together with the important settlements of San Vivaldo (Montaione) and of Vivaio (Incisa), was among the principal...
The sacred paraments displayed in the museum are only a limited part – as it comes out from the ancient inventories – of the basilica’s textile sets, increased over the centuries by precious gifts to the Virgin, especially on the occasion of the famous processions...
With the end of the Medici dynasty and the accession of the Lorraines, in the 18th century, the cult of the Virgin was somehow restrained. The Enlightenment policy tended to promote a lay state and was adverse to certain exterior displays, such as the cult...
The cult of the Madonna of Impruneta reached its climax with the Medici dynasty that came to define her as the Family Madonna”. If, during the grand duchy of Cosimo I, rather averse to exterior manifestations, there were only two processions, it was especially during...
