Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo Et Al

My A-Z Challenge series is about Italy, it's lifestyle, the country and other miscellaneous things in regard to it.

La Pieta by Michelangelo. Kept behind a toughened glass screen after being attacked by someone with a hammer.

Art in Italy is well known for it's beauty and splendor. It's everywhere, you can't walk for twenty minutes without passing some statue, painting or other work. Not all of it is famous but works from well known artists are literally everywhere,  in every town there will be something or worth to see.

One of the most well known of these artists is Leonardo da Vinci who painted the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper as well as other paintings and sculptures. Michelangelo of course is most well known for his painting of he Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, but also sculpted La Pieta also in the Vatican. Bernini's paintings and statues are all over Rome, but he also made many of the beautiful fountains around Rome, too, as well as much of the Baroque architechture, in fact you could say Rome is his workshop as so much of it is down to him. A lot of the works of most of the artists from times gone by are religious, this is due to the  Catholic Church commissioning a lot of it as this body had the wealth to pay, so as you move around Italy you will see many bible stories re-created.

Detail of a Bernini fountain in Rome

More older artists with their work around towns and cities to see are paintings in the church of Madonna Dell'Orto in Venice by Tintoretto and other artists, San Zaccaria which church houses the San Zaccaria Altarpiece by Bellini in Venice, and Florence Cathedral the architect of the dome being Brunelleschi, paintings by Uccello, Di Michelino and others, Florence also contains the Bell Tower by Giotto.

The previous are works by well known artists but there are works all around by less known but not less well done works which are very much worth seeing. It brightens your day to walk around somewhere, turn a corner and see some lovely statue, or see into a corner some splendid  piece of architecture. Of course there are also the Roman ruins, these seem to be just dropped or left in the most odd of places, a bit of old wall a broken statue, Rome tube station with part of its structure not modern and futuristic but actual 2000 year old Roman walls.

Detail of Tintoretto's The Presentation of the Virgin,
 in the church of Madonna Dell'Orto

There is The Assumption of the Virgin by Titian, found in the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari  in Venice, Statue of St John the Baptist by Donatello in  the Duomo di Sienna, and Caravaggio's The Crucifixion of St Peter in Rome in Santa Maria del Poppolo.

Just wander round and take in the sights, you won't be disappointed. Just don't mistake one of those busking statues for the real thing, some of those men and women make for very convincing statues.

Giotto's Campanile in Florence