Galleria dell' Accademia
(Academy Gallery)

Great Discoveries "Personal Tour Guides" will provide you with the most enjoyable and informative way to visit the Galleria dell' Accademia. Our carefully researched tour identifies and locates the most relevant treasures to ensure that you do not miss important works and that you clearly understand each items artistic and historic significance. As you view these carefully selected treasures, our professional narrators, accompanied by historically appropriate background music, will delight, amuse and inform you, making your visit a most memorable experience. Learn about this wonderful gallery and of course its most famous resident, Michelangelo's, David with informative descriptions, photo's, building diagrams, sample audio tracks and more.

The Galleria dell’ Accademia, today famous for its sculptures by Michelangelo, the Prisoners, the St. Matthew and specifically the statue of David, started in the mid 16th century as Europe’s first school of drawing. The Academia del Disegno, as it was known, was founded by the most illustrious Florentine artists of their day, Vasari, Bronzino and Ammannati and funded with donations by Cosimo I de Medici. Some 200 hundred years later in 1784, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Pietro Leopoldo of the Lorraine Dynasty brought together various art schools to create the first school in Europe to teach specifically the techniques of drawing, painting, and sculpture.

The ground floor is without any question the most famous and the most admired by its many annual visitors. They come to see the Florentine 15th Century Room, which contains a series of paintings from Florence created during the 15th century and the 19th Century Room, where you can see a collection of classically copied statues. You will still often find students sketching these great works of art no matter the time of day.

Be sure not to miss the Hall of the Colossus, which takes its name from a chalk rendition of Dioscuri di Montecavallo’s Horse which is presently located near Rome. In this room, you will find works by Florentine artists from the beginning of the 16th century. This eclectic collection also consists of works from the Byzantine era dated to around the 13th century, but overall it consists mostly of 14th and 15th century art.

When Florence became the capital of Italy the Accademia really under went some large changes and a modern gallery was added. It took up six tiny rooms on the first floor that used to be the school of Declamation. Its works of art were donated from the Palazzo della Crocetta. Once this collection was in place, it became the first modern gallery in the new state of Italy. Unfortunately, by the 1920’s most of this modern collection was dispersed between the Pitti Palace, the Uffizi, and the San Marco Museum. In the early part of the 19th century there was even a room dedicated to those paintings that had won prizes or ribbons.

In 1873, the Accademia received its star attraction, Michelangelo’s David. The great masterpiece was transferred here from its former home in front of the Palazzo Vecchio to protect it from the ravages of weather and time. The decision to move David indoors was made after the marble surface of his head and shoulders had begun to deteriorate. It took five days for them to transfer David the few short blocks from the Piazza della Signoria. They moved the colossal statue in a custom-built cart, which traveled through the streets of Florence on rails built especially for that purpose.

After David arrived at the Accademia he was forced to wait another nine years before he would be placed in the Tribune, a room designed specifically to house the world’s most famous statue. The Tribune, built in the form of a Latin cross with a skylight meant to highlight this colossal masterpiece, took ten years to complete. Its architect Emilio de Fabris, famous for creating the Duomo’s facade, began the project in 1872 and did not finish until 1882.

In 1501, the Arte della Lana, (Wool Guild) commissioned a young Michelangelo to sculpt a statue of David. They then presented the artist with a banged up, 18 foot block of marble that had lain abandoned in a church work yard for over 35 years. For three years, he etched the marble, bringing forth his own unique vision of the Biblical hero, creating the epitome of the Renaissance ideal of man in the process.

Michelangelo portrays his David in a tense moment of concentration, just before the slaying of Goliath. He possesses no supernatural powers, neither divine strength nor divine foresight. He stands with a slingshot over his shoulder and a stone in his other hand but he does not know how the battle will end. He squints into the sun and sees his enemy approaching from afar. He is vulnerable, and he is apprehensive, but he knows what he must do and he is determined. More than determined; his face exhibits that combination of strength and fierce intensity that Italians call terribilita, a word that has no English translation. Michelangelo’s remarkable talent and the communities understanding of the statues symbolic power and strength has made David the respected icon, which still thrives today.

Michelangelo’s David is the tallest teenager ever, measuring an amazing 14’3”. Over the years, he became known, to all who viewed him, as simply, “the Giant.”

Listen to short 2 minute samples of our content. You can also click on the picture for an enlarged view.

David

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