The Museo Marino Marini and Rucellai Chapel

In my post A Trip to Fiesole I talked about escaping the often crowded centre of Florence, but one needn't walk for miles to find a quiet spot, as there are plenty within the centre. One such a spot, fast becoming one of my favourites already, is the Museo Marino Marini, located in the Piazza di San Pancrazio just off Via della Spada. The museum's setting is the deconsecrated church of San Pancrazio (hence the name of the piazza), which had been a place of worship since around 931 CE, falling into the hands of Benedictine, Dominican and Vallombrosan Orders alike. In the Napoleonic era the church's 14th Century doorway was replaced by a Neoclassical façade of two columns and lions guarding the entrance, not long after which its Christian function ceased, the building converted into a court and a tobacco factory among other things before it became the Museo Marino Marini in the 1980s. But who was Marino Marini? 


Born in Pistoia in 1901, Marini is one of the most important Modernist sculptors of the 20th Century, and this museum is unique in its sole dedication to his work. He is most known for his bronze horsemen (or 'cavallieri') and nudes ('pomone') which take much inspiration from ancient Etruscan art. The museum also features many of his portraits and sketches, which show influence from Cubists like Picasso with whom Marini had contact on his visits to Paris, but it is the sculptures that take precedence, at once captivating and disturbing. What's more, the three times I've been here the place has been empty or nearly so, which helps one to engage more directly with the art on display without interruption of endless tourist groups or selfie sticks. 






Not only this but, being set in a former church, there is a Renaissance gem contained within the museum, which is Leon Battista Alberti's Rucellai Chapel. It makes for a rather strange juxtaposition, but it is well worth a visit if you've taken the trouble to visit the museum in the first place. Alberti was known for his mathematical proportioning, influenced in this regard by the Roman architect Vitruvius' treatises on inherent proportions in nature, and this sense of harmony is palpable upon entering the Rucellai Chapel, with its central tomb of white Apuan marble and dark green marble from Prato, and the crowning element decorated with Florence's symbol, the giglia (lily). The Rucellai family to whom this space is dedicated were an immensely wealthy family during the Renaissance, so much so that its then patriarch Giovanni Rucellai has his name emblazoned upon the façade of the city's grand Dominican church Santa Maria Novella to this day, also by Alberti. All in all, then, the Renaissance and the Modern come together unexpectedly in this unassuming museum, which I am sure I will be visiting again soon. 


The Rucellai Chapel is an unexpected bonus - I would have loved the museum even had it not been there!

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