Palazzo Pretorio | |
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General information | |
Type | Medieval Town Hall |
Location | Prato |
Address | piazza del Comune |
Coordinates | 43°52′49.92″N11°5′47.49″E / 43.8805333°N 11.0965250°E |
Construction started | 12th century |
Completed | 14th century |
Opened | reopened in 2013 as Museum |
Owner | Municipality of Prato |
Website | |
The Palazzo Pretorio is a historical building in Prato, Tuscany, Italy. [1] It was the old city hall, standing in front of the current Palazzo Comunale. It now accommodates the Civic Museum of Prato, which was reopened in September 2013.
The main structure in its present form was assembled during the late 13th century and early 14th century from the merger of three separate buildings, fused to house the local podestà, the judiciary and Prison. The different building materials, evident from the facade, still reveal the outlines of the earlier structures. The oldest part is the tower-house still discernible on the right (13th century), which had belonged to the family of Pipini, with a portico on the ground floor with pilasters of limestone then buffered but still visible. It was purchased in 1284 from the capitano del popolo Fresco Frescobaldi to house the municipal government. During the 16th century, the building, including the belltower, collapsed. The restoration added a new bell tower and crowning crenellations. The interiors were often divided into smaller rooms over time. Towards the end of 19th century, it was proposed for demolition, but by 1909 it was decided to restore the building.
The left hand part of the facade and building dates back to the 14th century and has eight elegant mullioned windows and a tabernacle. In this tabernacle, until at least 1799, stood a statue of the 14th century Robert of Anjou, once viewed as a defender of the city. Unfortunately, it was he, who sold Prato to Florence, ending the town's independence. From the portal on the ground floor one enters a series of rooms with original frescoes: the earliest frescoes (1307) by Bettino Corsino and later frescoes (1425) by Pietro di Miniato and Antonio di Miniato. The wide outdoor staircase leads to the main floor.
The Grand Duke Peter Leopold of Lorraine in 1788 expressed the intention of creating a school of design in Prato. By 1858, a collection of works in Prato were being assembled in a civic museum, housed in the nearby Palazzo Comunale. From 1912, the Palazzo Pretorio has hosted the Museo Civico, which contains many works of art ranging from medieval times to the 19th century.
Masaccio, born Tommaso di Ser Giovanni di Simone, was a Florentine artist who is regarded as the first great Italian painter of the Quattrocento period of the Italian Renaissance. According to Vasari, Masaccio was the best painter of his generation because of his skill at imitating nature, recreating lifelike figures and movements as well as a convincing sense of three-dimensionality. He employed nudes and foreshortenings in his figures. This had seldom been done before him.
Filippino Lippi was an Italian painter working in Florence, Italy during the later years of the Early Renaissance and first few years of the High Renaissance.
Pietro Perugino, born Pietro Vannucci, was an Italian Renaissance painter of the Umbrian school, who developed some of the qualities that found classic expression in the High Renaissance. Raphael was his most famous pupil.
Benozzo Gozzoli was an Italian Renaissance painter from Florence. A pupil of Fra Angelico, Gozzoli is best known for a series of murals in the Magi Chapel of the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, depicting festive, vibrant processions with fine attention to detail and a pronounced International Gothic influence. The chapel's fresco cycle reveals a new Renaissance interest in nature with its realistic depiction of landscapes and vivid human portraits. Gozzoli is considered one of the most prolific fresco painters of his generation. While he was mainly active in Tuscany, he also worked in Umbria and Rome.
Filippo Lippi, also known as Lippo Lippi, was an Italian painter of the Quattrocento and a Carmelite priest. He was an early Renaissance master of a painting workshop, who taught many painters. Sandro Botticelli and Francesco di Pesello were among his most distinguished pupils. His son, Filippino Lippi, also studied under him and assisted in some late works.
Fra Diamante was an Italian Renaissance painter.
Prato is a city and comune in Tuscany, Italy, the capital of the Province of Prato. The city lies north east of Tuscany, at an elevation of 65 metres (213 ft), at the foot of Monte Retaia. With 195,213 inhabitants as of 1 January 2023, Prato is Tuscany's second largest city and the third largest in Central Italy.
Ridolfo di Domenico Bigordi, better known as Ridolfo Ghirlandaio was an Italian Renaissance painter active mainly in Florence. He was the son of Domenico Ghirlandaio.
Prato Cathedral, or Cathedral of Saint Stephen, is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Prato, Tuscany, Central Italy, from 1954 the seat of the Bishop of Prato, having been previously, from 1653, a cathedral in the Diocese of Pistoia and Prato. It is dedicated to Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr.
The Galleria Sabauda is an art collection in the Italian city of Turin, which contains the royal art collections amassed by the House of Savoy over the centuries. It is located on Via XX Settembre, 86.
The decade of the 1450s in art involved many significant events, especially in sculpture.
The Madonna del Ceppo is a painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Filippo Lippi, commissioned to him between 1452 and 1453. It is housed in the Civic Museum of Prato, Italy. The name derives from the fact that it was located over a pit of the garden of Pia Casa dei Ceppi in Palazzo Datini, in Prato.
Palazzo Datini is a late 14th-century palace in Prato, Tuscany, central Italy. In 2015, the palace housed the offices of the Fondazione Casa Pia dei Ceppi, a charitable organization and a museum and archive.
Madonna with Child is a painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Filippo Lippi. The date in which it was executed is unknown, but most art historians agree that it was painted during the last part of Lippi's career, between 1450 and 1465. It is one of the few works by Lippi which was not executed with the help of his workshop and was an influential model for later depictions of the Madonna and Child, including those by Sandro Botticelli. The painting is housed in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy, and is therefore commonly called “The Uffizi Madonna” among art historians.
The Stories of St. Stephen and St. John the Baptist is a fresco cycle by the Italian Renaissance painter Filippo Lippi and his assistants, executed between 1452 and 1465. It is located in the Great Chapel of the Cathedral of Prato, Italy.
Domenico di Zanobi, formerly known as the Master of the Johnson Nativity, was an Italian Renaissance painter. His exact dates of birth and death are not known. He is documented as a mature artist from 1467 until 1481.
The Cathedral museum of Prato, Italy was founded in 1967 in a few rooms of the Bishop's residence and in 1976 grew to include items from both the Cathedral of Saint Stephen and the diocesan territory.
Lucrezia Buti was an Italian woman who became a Dominican novice and later, the lover of the painter Fra Filippo Lippi and the mother of their son and daughter. She is believed to be the model for several Madonnas featured in Lippi's paintings.
Adoration of the Christ Child is a tempera on panel altarpiece by Filippo Lippi, originally painted for the church of San Domenico in Prato and now in the city's Museo Civico. It is also known as Adoration of the Christ Child with St Vincent Ferrer or Nativity with St George and St Vincent Ferrer. It was painted between 1455 and 1466. The work was probably damaged by a fire in the church in 1467, requiring some repairs which were discovered in a recent restoration of the work.
The Bartolini Tondo is a tempera-on-panel painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Filippo Lippi. 135 cm in diameter, it is also known as Madonna with the Child and Scenes from the Life of St Anne or Madonna and Child with the Birth of the Virgin and the Meeting between St Joachim and St Anne. It is now in the Galleria Palatina in the Palazzo Pitti in Florence. The work is mentioned in the Palazzo Pitti inventories in 1761, which mention it as being stored or displayed in the "soffitte" or attics.
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