The Bardini Museum, located in via de' Renai at the corner with
piazza de' Mozzi in the Oltrarno district in Florence, is one of the
rich so-called "minor" museums of the city.
Since December
2014, the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities has managed
it through the Tuscany Museum Complex, which in December 2019 became
the Regional Directorate of Museums.
The museum, which has access in via dei Renai 37 (and exit at the
historic entrance in piazza dei Mozzi 1), constitutes the testamentary
bequest of the antiquarian Stefano Bardini (1836-1922) to the
Municipality of Florence.
Bardini built the building that houses
the museum in 1880, purchasing a complex of buildings from various
periods, including the deconsecrated church of San Gregorio della Pace,
built between 1273 and 1279 on land belonging to the Mozzi bankers at
the behest of Pope Gregory X to celebrate the peace between Guelphs and
Ghibellines. Passing under the patronage of the Bardi, in 1600 the
church was sold to the Clerics Regular Ministers of the Infirm or
Fathers of Ben Morire; in 1775 the order was suppressed and the church
and convent returned to the ownership of the Mozzis, who put them up for
sale in 1880.
Bardini transformed these buildings into an
imposing palace of eclectic taste using bare materials for the
construction: medieval and Renaissance stones, sculpted lintels,
fireplaces and stairways, as well as painted coffered ceilings: the
windows exhibits on the first floor of the facade, for example, they
come from the altars of a demolished church in Pistoia, San Lorenzo.
However, the complex of the Bardini property was much larger: among
other things, the thirteenth-century Palazzo Mozzi, which also overlooks
the square, and the historic park that extends for four hectares on the
slopes of the Belvedere hill (the Bardini Garden, recently restored),
with a magnificent view, in which there was a villa (villa Bardini) with
a panoramic loggia, remittances, workshops, service accommodation,
showrooms and warehouses.
Upon Bardini's death in 1922, the
museum was inherited by the Municipality of Florence, which transformed
it into the civic museum of the city, modifying the rooms and the
distribution of the works.
It was closed for renovations for
nearly a decade (since 1999) and reopened on April 4, 2009.
The museum houses an eclectic collection of more than 3600 works,
including paintings, sculptures, armor, musical instruments,
ceramics, coins, medals and antique furniture. Among the most
important works, the Charity by Tino di Camaino, the Madonna dei
Cordai by Donatello and a Madonna with Child attributed to the same
artist, glazed terracottas from the Della Robbia workshop, the
Archangel Michael by Antonio del Pollaiolo, the Martyrdom of a saint
by Tintoretto, a work by Guercino and thirty drawings by Tiepolo.
Two rooms on the ground floor are dedicated to Florence and its
history, with some emblematic works from the streets of the city:
the Boar by Pietro Tacca from the Porcellino fountain, the Diavolino
by Giambologna from the intersection between via dei Vecchietti and
via Strozzi, the gilded Marzocco from the architrave of Palazzo
Vecchio (all these works have been replaced for many years by local
copies and so far scattered in various state and municipal museums).
On the ground floor there is also the collection of sculptures and
the weapons room.
The room on the mezzanine floor is
dominated by a large medieval wooden Crucifix, with the collection
of wedding chests and a ceramic showcase on the wall. Ancient
carpets have been hung along the staircase, including the 7.50-metre
one, which was used on the occasion of Hitler's visit to Florence in
1938.
On the second and third floors are the paintings,
bronzes and the "live" restoration of Christ painted on a shaped
wooden cross from the Giotto school. Among the paintings, Hercules
at the crossroads by Domenico Beccafumi.
After Bardini's death, the museum had undergone some adaptations and
rearrangements that did not respect the original appearance, such as the
repainting of the walls. The restoration aimed above all at rebuilding
Bardini's museum as he had created it, with a preference for the blue
hues of the walls. The "Bardini blue", perhaps inspired by some of
Bardini's Russian clients such as Count Stroganoff, who in turn had seen
it in the neoclassical palaces of St. Petersburg, was also found, very
similarly, in the monumental halls of the Demidoffs' villa San Donato.
Copied by other collectors, in their homes which later in turn became
museums such as the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston or the
Jacquemart-André Museum in Paris, the color was not liked in Florence
and shortly after Bardini's death it was covered by a anonymous ocher.
During the restoration it was sought after through essays on the walls
and also thanks to a letter sent to Isabella Stewart Gardner where
Bardini revealed the secret of its color
The long restoration was
overseen by Antonella Nesi and was aimed at rediscovering the ancient
characteristics of the rooms.