I mai visti. XV edition The city of Hercules. Mythology and politics
“The figure of Hercules, which during the Renaissance period was the symbol of the Republic of Florence and its political ideals, is also an excellent symbol of today’s reform of the national and Florentine museums” states Eike Schmidt, director of the Uffizi Gallery. “Thanks to the dedication and the enthusiasm of dozens of people, we were able to put together this exhibition in less than six weeks”. Hercules is the undisputed protagonist of the exhibit that celebrates him for his extraordinary force and for his incredible deeds, and exploring through engravings, paintings and other art objects, specific iconographic themes rise such as the theme of Hercules at the crossroads between Vice and Virtue, that had an enormous diffusion from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century; or that of Hercules as a defender of the Muses, who protects art from the greediness of the patrons.
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Hercules is the undisputed protagonist of the exhibit that celebrates him for his extraordinary force and for his incredible deeds, and exploring through engravings, paintings and other art objects, specific iconographic themes rise such as the theme of Hercules at the crossroads between Vice and Virtue, that had an enormous diffusion from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century; or that of Hercules as a defender of the Muses, who protects art from the greediness of the patrons. He was very much loved by the Medici family too, so much that in the early part of his reign Cosimo de’ Medici, attentive judge of appropriate propaganda symbols of ducal power, used his own Hercules as a model to represent the virtues of the prince and even for the seal of the Duke, here exposed. For all to admire, “Hercules after defeating the Hydra” by Guido Reni, “Hercules crowned by the Muses” by Alessandro Allori, a magnificent marble bust never exposed before, from the half of the second century AD, that came from the deposits of Villa Corsini. A not to be missed exhibit!
