Cosimo I as a Collector
The legend of the Florentine “collections,” almost abandoned with the death of Lorenzo il Magnifico (1492), was revived with the restoration of the Medici and affirmed by Duke Cosimo I, who represented the collateral branch of the Giovanni di Bicci family. The reaffirmation of the Medici power manifested itself in Florence’s mercantile activity and in the continual embellishment of the city with works of art that exalted the reigning dynasty. Cosimo himself was not an outstanding collector, yet it was through him that such famous works as the Chimera of Arezzo and the Portrait of Pietro Aretino by Titian came to Florence. More importantly, Cosimo was responsible for assigning Giorgio Vasari the task of celebrating Florentine art from Cimabue to Michelangelo in his famous Lives of the Artists (1550, 1568). He was, moreover, a systematic collector of drawings by fourteenth and fifteenth century artists in his libri, or books, today dispersed among numerous collections.
With Palazzo Pitti still very much just an idea of the grand duke, Cosimo turned to Vasari to design the great building of the Uffizi, which, as its name (the Italian word for “offices”) indicates, once served primarily as the seat of the ducal administration. However, on the grand duke’s orders, the top floor housed a “gallery” containing all the different works of art of various provenances that had been accumulating in the Guardaroba. This location was endorsed by Cosimo's son and heir, Francesco I, with his building of the Tribune in the Uffizi designed by Buontalenti. The space became the site for the heart of the collection and has ever since played a central role in the conception of the Uffizi as a museum, serving as a sort of Schatzkammer representing the high point of the Medici collections. As well, it served as a mediating entity between the humanistic studiolo and the modern gallery. It was here that the collections' most precious objects were accumulated and that the paintings considered to represent Medici taste best were exhibited, beginning with the Doni Tondo by Michelangelo that entered the collection through Ferdinando I, in 1594.
The Uffizi was nonetheless still -- and would remain for a long time – the “Gallery of Statues,” the museum where the Medici began systematically to gather together those antiquities that would win the collection is greatest fame for centuries to come. The paintings, instead, were selected for their quality of execution, and eventually exhibited in the Tribune.
The Uffizi was nonetheless still -- and would remain for a long time – the “Gallery of Statues,” the museum where the Medici began systematically to gather together those antiquities that would win the collection is greatest fame for centuries to come. The paintings, instead, were selected for their quality of execution, and eventually exhibited in the Tribune.
Some works acquired by Cosimo I
Titian, Portrait of Pietro Aretino, Pitti
Painted in October 1545, this portrait was presented by Aretino to Cosimo I that same year. (Gregori, Mina, et al., Paintings in the Uffizi and Pitti Galleries, Little Brown and Co., Boston, 1994, p. 262.)
andrea del Sarto, The Young St. John, Pitti
This painting was commissioned by Giovan Maria Benintendi, perhaps as the finishing touch for the antechamber decorations done for him by Franciabigio, Bachiacca, adn Pontormo, which date from around 1523. Del Sarto's panel was given by Benintendi to Cosimo I on 30 December 1553. (Gregori, op. cit., p. 193.)
Raphael, Madonna of the Cloth, Pitti
Commissioned around 1514 by Bindo Altoviti, a Florentine banker who was opposed to the Medici and lived in Rome, the panel came into the Medici collection in 1554 with the confiscation of Altoviti's Florentine goods. (Gregori, op. cit. p. 170.)
Marco Chiarini, "From Palace to Museum: The History of the Florentine Galleries"; Paintings from the Uffizi & Palatine Galleries, Boston, 1994, p. 10.