Tuscany Holiday rent BLOG

The beautiful walled town of Lucca certainly has many events to offer all year round, but now even the small towns in its surroundings are starting to boast outstanding events. Until January 29^th, in fact, the Palazzo di Vetro in Porcari, Lucca, is hosting the exhibition “Andy Warhol… in the City”. The myth of Marilyn Monroe, the charm of Elizabeth Taylor, the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, the historic bottles of Coca Cola, the legendary cans of Campbell’s Soup – 80 works from the Art Motors and private collections.

These masterpieces intend to represent the artistic and iconographic path the American artist followed from 1957 to 1987 with an eye not only on his most famous works.

So while you’re wandering along the Via Francigena, leaving the historical centre of Lucca and going in the direction of Altopascio, by the Porta Elisa gate, stop off at Porcari and visit this exhibition. Tuscany Holiday Rent offers a rich variety of holiday accommodations in the Lucca area for those wishing to stay over.

The holiday season is here. Enjoy the fun of Florence wrapped by its Christmas lights and decorations. Give yourself a treat, some days’ holiday in one of the elegantly furnished apartaments in Florence, set in a carefully restored historical building, just a few minutes’ walk from Ponte Vecchio. This is one of the many interesting accommodations offered by Tuscanyholidayrent in the ” “Oltrarno” (beyond the river Arno). What about shopping in Florence in  such a holiday atmosphere? Among the many gifts you will bring back  home, one special for you: a visit to the Accademia

Don’t miss the opportunity to visit the exhibition of the 18^th century sculptor Lorenzo Bartolini. It has been extended up to January the 8^th 2012, because of its great success.

Focusing on Bartolini’s numerous plaster casts, owned by the Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence  rightly dedicates him an appealing exhibition to highlight his high-ranking production which has significantly marked the19^th century sculpture in Italy and Europe.

The masterworks on show turn around the19^th century main issues  such as  feelings, memory, ethical and civil values. The due homage to the artist who, in spite of his  French  experience, always felt a strong link with his motherland.

Born in 1777 in the outskirts of Prato, Bartolini had his training at Florence Academy  before leaving, at the end of the18^th century, for Paris. Here he  studied painting  under the guide of Federic Desmarais whose destiny, like Bartolini’s, would  be involved with Carrara Academy,as vice president, thanks to Elisa Baciocchi, Napoleon’s sister.

Paris, capital of art, and Carrara, iconic marble site, cross through an artistic liason.

In Paris Bartolini approached sculpture under the guide of Francois Frédèric Lemont

A curiosity: the visitors of the most Parisian  Place Vendome hardly know that  Bartolini executed parts of the  bas-relief of the Battle of Austerlitz, decorating the column domineering the octagonal square. Napoleon was crucial to Bartolini’s art. He was the Italian counterpart of the French painter David, being  the quasi-official portrait sculptor of the Bonapartes. Even after Napoleon’s fall, Bartolini ‘s fortune continued thanks to  his sister Elisa Baciocchi. In fact the Italian sculptor would later come  to direct the Carrara Academy of sculpture, in spite of the local  artistic opposition.

The exhibition variously includes the stylistic features of Bartolini .

On show the neoclassical period including the Bonaparte commissions  such as the bronze of Napoleon the 1^st directly coming from the Louvre and Elisa Napoleona  from the  Museum des Beaux Arts in Rennes. The art of Bartolini’s enriches itself into a wider perspective, deepening down into a new psychological subtlety, here witnessed by the portraits of the international intellectual milieu of the Grand Tour, such as M.me de Stael, Byron, Liszt, the Marquis of Londerry, the Demidoffs and Poniatowski.

Bartolini progressively abandons the neoclassic academic taste in favour of a closer imitation of nature.  A good example is the Ammostatore, featuring a young boy treading grapes who reminds us of the stylistic elements of Verrocchio and Donatello.

The statue paves the way to his most famous work ” Fiducia in Dio” executed in 1835 for Rosina Poldi Pezzoli who meant to express, through the commission, her faith after her husband’s death. The result is a naked young woman crouching in an attitude of a deep and secret devotion with hands joined in a prayer. It will  pave the way to a work of 1845 the Ninfa dello Scorpione much appreciated by Baudelaire himself.

A right homage from Florence to Bartolini, who has become a living memory of the Florentine everyday life. Anyone passing by or strolling downtown in Piazza Demidoff, can’t avoid casting a glance at his magnificently rich monument to Russian Nicola Demidoff who played a significant role in the artistic and cultural life of the 19^th century  Florence

North- east  Tuscany:  a wild landscape where the Apuan Alps meet the Mediterranean sea. This place deserves to be discovered. Tuscany Holiday Rent proposes  interesting holiday accommodations  in the area, nice apartments for rent in a villa on the Versilia coast, not far from  Carrara quarries. From the beach you can have a sight of them. Here, they, like white scars on the mountains, proudly stand, ready to tell their stories of great artists and humble quarrymen both struggling, though from different perspectives,  against the secrets of this wonderful stone. The focus of marble related activities is Carrara, a small town, already  known by the ancient  Romans who first exploited the quarries to state their challenge against  time and to asseverate their power. After the oblivion of the Middle Ages, marble in the Renaissance was back in use, widely employed in Florence, Rome and Venice. Michelangelo, the artist of the “Pietà”, used to come here to  personally choose  the” Statuario” (the white marble for sculptures). The foundation of  the Academy of Fine Arts, dating back to1769, stated the vocation of the land, thanks to  Maria Teresa Cybo- Malaspina  from a Genoa family of rich merchants,  well connected with  the most prestigious European noble families. The famous institution was boosted  by Napoleon  who bestowed the Grand  Duchy of Tuscany on his sister Elisa Baciocchi.  It’s the season of Neoclassicism.  Famous sculptors such as the French Chinard, the Italian Canova or the Danish Thorvaldsen came to Carrara,  either to choose the marble blocks or to directly work in the best local workshops. To Carrara artistic tradition  the homage of the exhibition “ D’Apres Canova. L’800 a Carrara (After Canova, the 19^th century in Carrara), inaugurated in June 2011, and lasting up to June 2012 . The event shows 26 plaster casts from the Academy  collection. A charming tour  into the manifold streams of the 19th century Carrara sculpture.

The visitor is firstly welcomed by the 1810 sculpture of Napoleon’s mother, Letizia Ramolino Bonaparte by Canova,  the reference artist for Carrara  sculptors, together with Lorenzo Bartolini and Bertel Thorvaldsen.   Pietro Tenerani is   emblematic in this sense. His “Paride” ,“Psyche  Abandoned” and” Psyche Fainted”, are so close to the stylistic elements of  Canova. Later he will lately abandon Canova’s  path, to surrender to his statues’ inner lives. He, in fact,  will  pave the way to the peculiar style of what will be later defined as the “Scuola di Carrara” well represented by Bernardo Tacca and Luigi Bienaimè.  Among the outstanding sculptors the exhibition highlights  particularly Carlo Finelli  who, though  heir to Canova,  succeeds in overcoming classicism in his masterpiece “Le Ore” because of the work’s psychological connotation and movement,  beyond any abstraction and stiffness of the great neoclassical artist.

Actually times are changing and something new is springing out. Hence the new social approach to art  by Pietro Lazzerini and Carlo Nicoli . The  echoes of a new perception of life are creeping inside  the Academia  where the first romantic and realistic hints  are  timidly trying to shadow neoclassical taste, still hard to die.

A short  romantic escape  to Florence before the oncoming winter. You could catch the opportunity to see this magical town in its autumn changing lights. TuscanyHolidayRent offers an interesting opportunity for accommodation in Florence on the west side of Arno River, called ” Oltrarno”.  A 10% reduction on elegantly furnished apartaments , just a few minutes’  walk from Ponte Vecchio, the Uffizi or Piazza della Signoria.
The historical building in Costa SanGiorgio,  consisting of seven apartaments, is the  result of a lovingly careful restauration,  rich in charming details.
Arched ceilings, antique brick walls, wide  terraces enjoying a 360 view of the town or  smaller ones overlooking  Santa Croce Church make these accommodations  unique.
Can you imagine a  better way to say goodbye to the parting day, relaxing in a terrace overlooking Florence roofs, holding in your hand a glass of good Chianti wine?
From the intimacy of the nice accommodation offered by Tuscany Holiday Rent  let’s now move  outside to explore the exceptional artistic heritage of the town : the Uffizi ,  the Bargello, San Marco Museum , the Medici Chapels, the Casa Buonarroti, the  Palazzo Pitti  just to mention some of the worldwide famous icons. In this town, which is an open air museum, even the simple strolling around can become an intriguing adventure.
Tuscany Holiday Rent would  like to suggest  in your wonderings  a special visit to the Rose Garden just under Piazzale Michelangelo, to the recently opened  permanent exhibition by Jean Michel Folon, a worldwide famous  Belgian artist.
His  twelve statues are now standing there throughout the Rose Garden,
perfectly dialoguing with the surrounding environment and with the people
coming here.
“Je me souviens”,  a work of 2003,  features  a male figure sitting on a bench and  looking  like being  ready to communicate with whomever happens to sit next to
him . Folon’s visionary world  just waits to be discovered. You will feel like Alice in
Wonderland . Like her, in your stroll you will be bumping into  a blue statue “
Chat”, shaping a cat peacefully resting on the lawn among the rose bushes .The
dialogue between man and nature, between art and  imagination is here at its
best.  Folon used to say “Toutes mes sculptures regardent le ciel, c’est un facon
de mettre le ciel dans la sculpture”. Actually he meant the sky of Florence, the
town which  has always been a permanent reference point for him up to his last exhibiton at Forte Belvedere, six years ago before his death.
He would have loved – he  used to say- to find a home here with a nice garden where to settle his works which had to outlive him. Such a wish convinced his widow, Paola Ghiringhelli,  to give Florence municipality the twelve statues now  permanently placed in the Rose Park.  As Folon’s last homage  to Florence the sculpture “Partir”(leaving),  at the
entrance of the park. As a traveller of the inner artistic world, he has placed
here, before his final departure,  a visionary  suitcase, in the shape of  a big, rusty
rectangular shape framing down a boat floating on the waves of an unknown
sea. Through it our eye can wonder on Florence skyline,  made up of Palazzo
Vecchio and the dome of Brunelleschi.
This is Folon’s last symbolic goodbye to the world and in particular  to Florence, his
first love since when he  came here hitchhiking,  as a young boy.