BE GO Benozzo Gozzoli museum
Benozzo Gozzoli is the "genius loci" of Valdelsa. From San Gimignano in Certaldo to Castelfiorentino, his works were set in the shadow of venerable bell towers and civic structures as ancient and proud as the local people themselves.
Benozzo felt at home in Valdelsa. The people appreciated his painting, which had a sophisticated yet common air that was captivating, expressed with grace and awareness. Though more than five centuries have gone by, Benozzo is still alive in the memories and hearts of the inhabitants. From generation to generation, the citizens of today and their public administration have inherited a warm appreciation, affection and gratitude for an artist who worked for the Pope in Rome and the Medicis in Florence, but who in the end was attracted by the rustic beauty of this valley more than any other place in Italy.
This explains the creation of a museum dedicated to Benozzo in Castelfiorentino. A project by the architect Massimo Mariani, backed by financing from local authorities and the Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze, realized a structure specially designed to host the detached frescos of two famous tabernacles (the Madonna of the Cough and the Madonna of the Visitation) that Benozzo Gozzoli painted locally in 1484 and 1491, respectively.
The information project directed by Serena Nocentini, Elena Fani and the Historical Institute of Science [Istituto di Storia della Scienza] of Florence allows visitors to see and to know the entire artistic progression of Benozzo. Everyone should know that the painter who loved Valdelsa is there through his works in Castelfiorentino, but also in the Palazzi Apostolici of Rome, in the Medicis house in Florence, the Camposanto Monumentale in Pisa, in Montefalco and in Orvieto, in Volterra, in Viterbo and in Terni as well as other museums in Italy and throughout the world.
Antonio Paolucci