Meglio Tardi Che Mai

February 27

The Saints class met at Piazza della Repubblica in order to discuss sculptures in public spaces. My lack of sleep became apparent when I could name every column I’ve ever seen—except the ones with statues originally on top. From there we studied the statues surrounding Palazzo Vecchio (it’s interesting to look at paintings from over the years and see how much the statues have been moved around). We went into Palazzo Vecchio and discussed the history of the building. The façade of the building used to face towards the Duomo and the clock tower is off-center because it is built over the remains of an ancient clan that once tried to overthrow Florence. After a quick trip to Orsanmichele (we all feel like experts on the guilds by now) our midterms were returned and we were free to go.

February 28

The Medici class started out at San Apollonia. I like doing repeat visits with different professors because it’s interesting to hear their diverse opinions on different pieces. We realized that Vasari likes to make things up—he constructed a plot in which Andrea del Castagno murdered Domenico Veneziano, which wouldn’t have been possible because Castagno would have had to come back from the dead to do so. He just really didn’t like Castagno (Vasari wrote the infamous Lives of the Artists, one of our texts for the class). After revisiting Santissima Annunziata, Jodie offered an optional visit to the Ospedale degli Innocenti (Hospital of the Innocents), which used to be an orphanage. It is currently used as a museum, preschool, and holds offices for different children’s organizations. We got to see Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, and Piero di Cosimo (no, not a Medici). Also, I had gelato twice today. This is slowly becoming more dangerous than the chocolate festival.

February 29

The weather was warm enough that I made it through three-fourths of our tour of Santa Maria Novella without getting cold—it’s a miracle! In Italian, we learned the song “Salvami” (Umberto picks songs that relate to whatever tense or grammatical thingamajig we’re learning), which we sang horribly off key several times. Afterwards, we all attended an orientation for our trip to Venice. I knew I was excited about the trip, but I didn’t realize how much—apparently, I was excitedly bouncing around in my chair the entire time (and just about fell out of my chair when Jodie told us about the museum passes that we’d be getting). Afterwards, I went out for gelato with a group of classmates, and then took the long way home (meaning that I purposely skipped my street and kept walking half an hour out of the way because that building waaaay down there looks really interesting).

March 1

Although I didn’t have class in the morning, I trekked over to Linguaviva early (ish) with the library’s copy of Giorgio Vasari’s Lives of the Artists, and finished reading up on Michelangelo for my report (I’d been working on this for a few days, Vasari dedicated over 160 pages of his book to him). Vasari basically believes that Michelangelo is divine, a saint even. Well, now that I think about it, I’m pretty obsessed with Michelangelo too, so I can’t make fun of Vasari too much. After Italian, the Medici class took the bus up to San Miniato al Monte, one of the first places we visited in Florence. I wouldn’t mind living up on that hill.