At the Gates of Paradise

The crowd at the opening of The Splendour of the Medici: Art and Life in Renaissance Florence, an exhibition at the Musuem of Fine Arts

Minister of Education and Culture István Hiller

There are altogether 200 objects on display, but the unmatched whole is magically alive. The exhibition presents the birth, height and decline of the Renaissance as seen through the history of the Medici dynasty. Thanks to the work of the exhibition's Italian curators, Annamaria Giusti and Monica Bietti, visitors really do feel as if they are guests in the court of the famous family from Florence.

The exhibition brings one into close company from the start. The dark blue and wine colours as well as the special lighting bring visitors deep into the display cases. The 600-year-old silk brocade with gold accents, decorated coffers for trade documents and a famous portrait by Pollaiuolo all attest to the Quattrocento, when the Medicis defined Italy's culture. Early city maps, Bramante's original wooden model of the cupola of the Florence Cathedral, Sangallo's model of the Palazzo Rucella, codices and collections of poems all show the Medicis and their connection to Florence.

The exhibition is divided into two main parts, showing works from the Quattrocento and the Cinquecento. In between the two emerges the figure of Savonarola, the anti-Renaissance priest whose followers went door-to-door collecting art to be burned at the Bonfire of the Vanities in 1497. It is thereafter that the real parade of art starts: works by Fra Angelico, Mantegna, Uccello, Donatello, Botticelli, Raphael, da Vinci and Michelangelo. Never before have so many such works been seen together in Budapest. The Medicis have opened all doors to us.