
Beyond Words: Italian Renaissance Books at The Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum displayed manuscripts housed in museums and colleges in the Boston area. The exhibit, with its photographic backdrop of the Laurentian Library, catapulted me back to Florence and the Church of San Lorenzo where the library is located. The exhibit is part of a city-wide collaborative project entitled Beyond Words: Illuminated Manuscripts in Boston Collections. These exhibits are open through January 16, 2017.
Tomorrow I fly to Florence, where Lucca, Andrea and Giovanni della Robbia lived and worked. I’ll see their colorful terra cottas in museums and churches. I’ll walk by Lucca’s blue and white putti that decorate the Ospedale degli Innocenti(Foundling Hospital) on Piazza della Santissima Annunziata. I will gaze at original manuscripts in the church libraries. I will be very grateful.