Italy Cruise and Italy Tour Visitors to Florence Will See David Atop Il Duomo

On a Italy tour to Florence or a Italy cruise to Livorno next Friday? If so your Italy cruise and Italy tour will have unique opportunity to see Michelangelo's David standing atop Florence's Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral. Italy cruise and Italy tour travelers will see a fibreglass Michelangelo’s David copy erected on a pedestal high up by the Duomo's dome for one day as part of Florence 2010 culture week.

If your Italy cruise or Italy tour stops in Florence be sure to look up at the Duomo for a rare Italy tour and Italy cruise Italian tourism event.

Prior to Michelangelo's involvement, Overseers of the people of Office of Works of the Duomo (Operai), had plans to commission a series of twelve large Old Testament sculptures for the buttresses of the cathedral of Santa Maria Del Fiore. Two had been created independently by Donatello and his assistant, D'agostino di Duccio. Italy tour and Italy cruise travelers will find original works on the Duomo in the Operai Museum.

In 1464 Agostino was contracted to create a sculpture of Michelangelo’s David. A block of marble was provided from Carrara, close to the Italy cruise port Livorno, and popular Italy tour destination. Agostino began to shape the legs, feet and the figure. His association with the project ceased with the death of his master Donatello in 1466.

In 1500, an inventory of the cathedral workshops described the piece as "a certain figure of marble called Michelangelo’s David, badly blocked out and supine." Documents showed that the Operai were determined to find an artist who could take this large piece of marble and turn it into a finished work of art. They ordered the block of stone, which they called The Giant, "raised on its feet" so that a master experienced in this kind of work might examine it and express an opinion. Though Leonardo da Vinci and others were consulted, it was young Michelangelo, only twenty-six years old, who convinced the Operai that he deserved the commission.

When the sculpture was nearing completion, a committee of Florentine artists including Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli met to decide on an appropriate site for Michelangelo’s David. The majority, led by Giuliano da Sangallo and supported by Leonardo and Piero di Cosimo, believed that due to the imperfections in the marble the sculpture should be placed under the roof of the Loggia dei Lanzi on Piazza della Signoria, favorite Italy cruise day tour and Italy tour destination in Florence. A few, supported by Botticelli, believed Michelangelo's David should be situated on or near the cathedral.

Michelangelo’s David was placed in front of the entrance to Italy tour and Italy cruise passenger favorite site the Palazzo Vecchio, also on Piazza della Signoria, replacing Donatello's bronze sculpture of Judith and Holofernes.

Italy cruise travelers to Venice and Italy tours to Venice may take a trip to Padua to visit Donatello's famous bronze horse sculpture.

Michelangelo's interpretation of the biblical figure was unveiled in Piazza della Signoria in 1504, seat of Florence civic government where Italy tour and Italy cruise travelers go to enter the Uffizi Gallery. To conserve Michelangelo’s David for Italy tour and Italy cruise passengers forever David was moved to the famous museum Galleria dell'Accademia where it is a must-see for Italy cruise travelers who day trip to Florence and Italy tours stream by daily to see.

Michelangelo’s David came to be seen as an emblem of the city republic's pride, its ability, despite its small size, to defend itself against giants like Rome, other cities on the Italian peninsula, and the Medici family. The eyes of Michelangelo’s David, with a warning glare, were turned towards Rome. Michelangelo’s David also represents the Renaissance ideal of manhood.

Msgr Timothy Verdon, American director of Florence's Diocesan Office for Fine Art and Cultural Heritage, argues today that faith, not politics, was at the forefront of the young Michelangelo's mind while he was chiselling the marble for three years, thus giving Italy tour and Italy cruise passengers the chance to see Michelangelo’s David on top of il Duomo.

''The special political situation of Florence in 1504 led to Michelangelo’s David being valued in a civic sense, transforming the biblical figure into a symbol of the republican freedom that at the time was under threat on many sides,'' Verdon wrote in an article in the weekly Toscana Oggi, available for Italy tour and Italy cruise information. ''But for Michelangelo, David was a religious figure both in the conceptual stage and for almost all of its creation - the shepherd-king who wanted to build the temple in Jerusalem that was physically constructed by his son Solomon; Jesus's ancestor''.

In 1873, after 469 years, the David was taken out of the elements and put in the Galleria dell'Accademia. A copy was erected to replace it in Piazza della Signoria - where many italy cruise and Itay tour travelers take it for the real thing. The new fibreglass copy will tour several Florence sites after its stint at the Duomo.

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