The ceilings….amazing! For this post, I will use some examples just from Florence and not other places I’ve been (since I started this post while still in Florence and am finally finishing it in Arizona). These ceilings will give you a sense of some of the different ceiling styles in the Renaissance. First, the wonderful and amazing dome in the Duomo.
By the way, for a good read, try learning about Filippo Brunelleschi and the building of the dome on the Duomo. It is an amazing architectural achievement for the mid 1400s. Perhaps I’ll post more on the Duomo as a whole and the building of the dome in particular.
Right next door in the Baptistery (an older building than the Duomo) is this ceiling. This photo is a small section of the entire dome, showing Christ on His throne of judgment.
Here is a larger photo of the Baptistery Dome.
The Palazzo Vechio, city hall for Florence, had a number of ceilings worth noting. First, the main meeting room, still in use today (and shown in the photo on the left), had a large ceiling entirely covered in paintings.. The photo on the right is a small section of the ceiling, it being rather hard to get a shot of the entirety.
The Palazzo Vechio also had other interesting ceilings, but not all were the more common paintings of people and animals, as these two rooms below show.
The Pitti Palace had a series of impressive ceilings and domes, with every surface covered with sculptures, paintings, or carvings. Here are a couple of photos of some of the detail and then a larger shot from the Pitti Palace.
This ceiling (still Pitti Palace) is not really as high as it looks–it is painted to look like it has another floor. Can you see the “person” up on the balcony looking over the edge?
The Medici Chapels had the same impressive work on the ceilings (and the walls and floor, of course) as in the photo on the left, but one of the rooms (of this mausoleum) with wonderful carving from Michelangelo had a plain dome (photo on the right). It was rather a peaceful change and let the attention rest on the sculptures.
After all the ceilings covered in paint or frescoes, to see a carved wood was also a welcome change. With two examples, first is this ceiling in the library at San Lorenzo, which was designed by Michelangelo, and second is a ceilings in Santa Croce Church.
Santa Maria Novella had plainer ceilings in much of the building, but did have some painted ceilings in the Chapter Hall (note the painting of Christ rescuing Peter from the Sea of Galilee.)
Finally, for an end to this post, a rather distinctive terracotta ceiling in Santa Croce, and in another room in Santa Croce, two angels to protect us on our way.
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