Uffizi

Uffizi is THE museum to see in Florence. The lines are long, there’s much to see, and it’s curated beautifully with a quirky sense of humor that I really appreciated. We weren’t sure we’d get to see it today, and then we feared that we wouldn’t get to see it at all because it looked like all of the buy-ahead-of-time reservation spots were booked for the whole weekend, and we leave Monday. Nooooo! But Travis doggedly check signs and doors before we went to Accademia and we figured out that you could just buy reservations on site, so we did that. Yay!

When you enter Uffizi, you go straight to the second floor. You don’t have to, but the crowd moves that way. That’s the top floor, and you can work your way down from there. This is what greets you at the top of those stairs:

Everyone else is behaving except this one guy in the middle. “Um WUT? She did NOT just say that.”

I love how they’re arranged to be looking at one another.

And look, here’s a statue of a dog doing the lazy-butt sit just like my dog does. He’s probably begging for cheese, just like mine.

Upon walking past these busts and this puppy, you enter one of many long hallways lined with I think were mostly Greek and Roman statues and busts. Notice at the top of the walls, near the ceilings, the lines of portraits. One after another, through all the hallways, like they ran out of room and that was convenient storage. You almost don’t notice them individually, only the sheer number of them.

Some of the busts that caught my eye:

Caligula, not a nice man.

Claudius, a much nicer man and better emperor.

Constantine — who, if I’m honest, looks like a bit of a jerk. But when you’re battling for control of an empire that is threatening to break in two and trying to lead it to yet greater days, while completely changing the religious makeup of said empire, you might get that look in the end. I also have to admit that I’m not sure which Constantine (or Constantius) this is. There are several.

It’s at about this point that the tour groups will make you feel like this:

There aren’t too many people interested in the hallways, so picture taking is easy. But in the galleries themselves, located right off the hallways, it’s another story and getting a decent shot can be challenging. There’s also nothing like standing behind a tour group that has blocked up a hallway. Thank you, tour groups. Thank you especially to those groups who give everyone in the group earbuds, thus preventing their guide from shouting (a genuine moment of gratitude here) but rendering all group members deaf and dumb to those around them. I recommend patience here, and if you can’t take a picture… well, your photo wouldn’t do it justice, and enjoy the experience of being in the museum anyway.

There’s also a lot to see — things like the Birth of Venus:

And any number of other famed works, including ones by Rembrandt:

Plus unattributed works like this one:

One of my favorite galleries was the Greek/Roman one. This was in addition to all of the works in the hallways.

Relief of the Ara Pacis Augustae with Procession:

Relief with Dancing Maenads:

I don’t know what this was, but I liked it. It felt well designed.

And a sort-of buddy of mine from college, Aristotle. Always liked him, never quite understood him enough.

This next set of shots I honestly can’t give much background on, except that we had again escaped the tour groups and this was a quiet room with photo opportunities. The arrangement of the sculptures was striking.

Running from something…

Running to the window…

Here’s another example of what I mean about the quirky humor at Uffizi:

“Need to exit? Run this way!”

These statues seem to participate in the museum with you. They are not merely there to be gazed upon, but they direct you, interact with one another, look in the same directions you would.

Many of the hallways on both floors of the museum provide some remarkable outdoor views.