Visiting an art musuem and 1,000 year-old church

Saturday, March 11, 2017
From Piazzale Michelangelo. The flowers spell Amo Firenze, I love Florence. Photo by Steve Reed/Cottey College

Steve Reed, Cottey College's director of public information, is traveling in Italy with approximately 70 members of the Cottey sophomore class and other faculty, as part of the Cottey International Experience held over the first week of spring break. He, along with his wife, Angie Casavecchia, public administrator for Jasper County, are reporting on the trip. Steve sends his reports as letters to his mother.

Buon giorno, Mama!

Today begins our last day in beautiful Florence. We have a group activity for all the students and leaders this morning; we are going to the world-famous Uffizi Museum to see some of the finest art works in the world.

Uffizi is Italian for offices, and this museum is named that because this magnificent facility once served as the offices of the Medici family who ruled the republic of Florence for approximately 300 years. There are no surviving members of the Medici family today.

In fact, when the last of the Medicis was still living, she inventoried the artwork that belonged to the family and bequeathed it and the building to the people and the city of Florence.

When we arrived at the Uffizi, we had a pleasant surprise. Because it was the International Day of the Woman, Florence was granting free admission to women that day to all of its museums! Pretty cool perk for a large group from a women's college.

Our large group was divided into four smaller groups and each group had a trained tour guide to show us the highlights of the museum. A person could spend a whole day in there and not be able to see everything, so this was a smart idea. Our guide, a local woman named Luticia, said she would concentrate on works from the Renaissance (although she did also point out some things from the Roman era).

Our tour guide at the Uffizi, Leticia. Photo by Steve Reed/Cottey College

We were going to look at works from Boticelli, Raphael, Michaelangelo, and Da Vinci in particular. At each work, Luticia gave us some information about it and the artist, occasionally some back story about the commission of the painting, and why it was important. It was just the right balance of fact and narrative to keep it from sounding like an art history lecture. It was interesting enough that our two-hour tour flew by.

I asked a couple of our students which painting they liked best, and the most common answer was Michelangelo's Holy Family. They all remembered this was Michelangelo's only panel painting, all of his other paintings are frescoes on walls and ceilings. I love the bright colors, and find it interesting that the Virgin Mary has short hair.

After the official tour, students could stay longer if they wished, or they were free to go. As it was noon by then, I think almost all of us were hungry and wanted to find something to eat. I said good-bye to the students in our group, and then Angie and I were off in search of, what else, gelato!

Our tour guides had told me the night before that they thought the best gelato in Florence was at a place called GROM. I had instructions on where to find it, but even then, with these narrow twisting streets it took a few minutes to find it tucked away on the corner in an alley.

It was well worth the search, however, as this truly was some of the best gelato I have ever eaten. Angie had a cone with three different flavors of cioccolato (chocolate). I had a scoop of vanilla with pine nuts and cookies, topped with a scoop of walnuts, topped with a scoop of chocolate. Best. Lunch. Ever.

We then went inside the church of Santa Maria del Fiore, which is topped by the iconic dome by Brunelleschi. The church is often referred to simply as the Duomo.

You can purchase a ticket that allows you to climb to the top of the dome, but Angie wanted nothing to do with that! We found out later that a couple of our students did climb the dome that afternoon. One admitted her thighs were really sore after climbing several hundred steps.

It was still a wonderful experience to see the inside of the dome and the magnificent artwork that covered it. Those painters must have had no fear of heights, Mama!

After time in the church, Angie wanted to pick up a few more souvenirs at the market in San Lorenzo. On the way back to the hotel, I took her by a shop on the other side of he Ponte Vecchio that sold really neat shirts and bags with bicycle designs and sayings on them.

You know how we love to ride our bikes, Mama, so this was a great place for us to buy something for ourselves. I picked out a shirt with a bike design and biking expressions written down in several languages. The saying that sold me on the shirt was one in French: Je pedale et je chante. It means: I pedal and I sing. I have been known to do just that while on my bike.

Angie chose to relax a bit at the hotel before dinner. I however wanted to revisit the Piazzale (Pee-ah-zall-eh) Michelangelo, a park on a tall hill above the city. It has some of the best views of old Florence to be found, if you're willing to work for it! My colleague Margaret told me to continue climbing above the Piazzale to a historic church called San Miniato al Monte (San Min-ee-ah-toh al mon-tee), Saint Minias of the mount, or hill.

It was well worth the extra hiking as it truly had breathtaking views of the city. Plus the basilica, which was built in 1018, was fascinating. I sat in the pews of a church that was more than a thousand years old! The feeling of history was amazing as I sat there and looked at paintings on the wall that are older than our country. I was chatting with a student later and we noted how when we talk about something in America that is really old, we're generally speaking about things that are less than 300 years old. But when we say something in Italy is really old, we are talking about something that is 1,000-2,000 years old.

The faculty and staff ate dinner together tonight (we went back to Za-Za's for amazing pasta). On our walk there we encountered a protest or parade that extended several blocks. There was singing and chanting and participants carried signs. We're pretty sure it had something to do with women's rights and the International Day of the Woman. Whatever it was, it was festive and we had to pass through the middle of it to get to the restaurant.

After dinner a few of us were walking back together and mentioning again how fascinating it is to walk through these historic cobbled streets past churches and buildings hundreds of years old and to wonder which famous Italians may have walked the very same streets we were walking. Perhaps we were walking where Da Vinci or Michelangelo had passed. I hope our Cottey students are getting the same sense of history we are.

We've arrived back at the hotel, Mama, and we have some packing yet to do before tomorrow's journey.

Another wonderful day in a beautiful city with a great group of students.

Alla prossima,

Your loving son,

Steve

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