Welcome to
. The following is part of our Atlas’ Notebook series, featuring art, poetry, literature, cartography, and photography, all centred on a particular place. For the full map of Cosmographia posts, see here.The centre of Florence remains as it has done for half a millennium. As you wander its streets, you can’t help but think: are my feet falling where the Medicis once trod, do my eyes drink in the same views that sparked Michelangelo’s imagination? Perhaps I’m sitting in Donatello’s favourite spot, or taking a picture where da Vinci once sketched? For some, this thought flits on by. For others, it transforms an ordinary holiday into a pilgrimage of the soul.
Like all the great cities, Florence is more than the sum of its parts. If New York is hustle, and Paris is romance, then Florence is creativity in city form. To walk her streets is to feel connected to its soaring achievements in art and poetry — one can’t help but be inspired.
I. In Art
How can one choose just one piece of art for a city as dripping in masterpieces as Florence? Well, I decided I couldn’t, so here’s four instead:
