500 ANNIVERSARY OF BIRTH OF GIORGIO VASARI

Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 - 27 June 1574) was an Italian painter, writer, architect and historian, who is today famous for his biographies of italian artist, but his most famous construction is..... THE UFFIZI GALLERY and THE VASARIAN CORRIDOR connecting the OLD PALACE with THE PITTI PALACE.

Vasari's self-portrait

Vasari was born in Arezzo - Tuscany. Recommended at an early age by his cousin Luca Signorelli, he became a pupil of Guglielmo da Marsiglia, a skillful painter of stained glass. Sent to Florence at the age of sixteen by Cardinal Silvio Passerini, he joined the circle of Andrea del Sarto and his pupils Rosso Fiorentino and Jacopo Pontormo where his humanist education was encouraged. He was fascinated by Michelangelo whoso painting style would influence his own.

In 1529, he visited Rome and studied the works of Raphael and others of the Roman High Renaissance. Vasari's own Mannerist paintings were more admired in his lifetime then afterwards. In 1547 Vasari completes the hall of the chancery in Palazzo della Cancelleria in Rome with frescoes that received the name Sala dei Cento Giorni.

Sala dei Cento Giorni Rome Italy

Sala dei Cento Giorni, Rome Italy

He was consistently employed by the Medici Family in Florence and Rome, and he worked also in Neaples, Arezzo and many other places. Many of his pictures still exist, the most important being the wall and ceiling paintings in the great Sala di Cosimo I of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, where he and his assistants were at work from 1555, and the frescoes he started inside the vast cupola of the Duomo, completed by Federico Zuccari and with the help of Giovanni Balducci. He also helped organize the decoration of the Studiolo, now reassembled in the Palazzo Vecchio.

Frescoes athe the cupola del Duomo Florence Italy

As an architect, Vasari was perhaps more successful than as a painter. His loggia of the Uffizi Gallery by the Arno opens up the vista at the far end of its long narrow courtyard, a unique piece of planning that function as a public piazza, and which, if considered as a short street, is the unique Loggia from the Arno reveals that, with the Vasari Corridor, it is one of very few structures that line the river which are open to the river itself and appear to embrace the riverside environment.

The Loggia degli Uffizi seen from the Arno river

In Florence, Vasari also built the long passage, now called Vasari Corridor, which connects the Uffizi with the Pitti Palace which is situated at the other side of the river. The enclosed corridor passes alongside the river on the arcade, crosses the Old Bridge and winds around the exterior of several buildings.

The Vasari Corridor over the Old Bridge Florence Italy

Vasari also renovated the fine medieval churches of Santa Maria Novella and Santa Croce, from both of which he removed the original screen and loft, and remodelled the retro choir in the Mannerist taste of his time.

In 1562 Vasari built the octagonal dome atop the Basilica of Our Lady Humility in Pistoia, an important example of High Renaissance architecture.

In rome, he worked at Pope Julius III's Villa Giulia.
In 1547, he built himself a fine house in Arezzo (now a museum honouring him).
In 1563, he helped found the Florence Accademia e Compagnia delle Arti del Disegno, with the Grand Duke Cosimo I de' Medici and Michelangelo as head of the istitution and 36 artists chosen as members.

Vasari died in Florence on 27 June 1574.

The Castration of Uranus: fresco by Vasari and Cristofano Gherardi
c. 1560, Sala di Cosimo I, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence Italy

Please find here more informations about the guided tours of the Vasari's masterpieces organized from the Museo dei Ragazzi of Palazzo Vecchio - http://www.palazzovecchio-familymuseum.it/?p=4112