Day 31 | The Ufizzi and the Gallery of the Academy
Day 31, Florence—It was another beautiful day in Florence!
You may already know this before you see my photos below, but the museums we have been visiting have a lot of art with naked people...men and women. I knew this was going to happen before we even started planning for this trip. At first I struggled with how to handle the fact that my kids would be walking through these exhibits. We knew we didn’t want to shield them from all of the art, but it would be difficult and not practical to shield them from only some of it. We knew we had to educate them.
Before we left...never mind the fact that it was the day before we left our house...we talked and I read them some books. We talked about what they might be seeing and reviewed what we’d talked about in the past about our bodies and how God made men and women. I read to them the books that told about how God designed our bodies and how God lovingly designed how babies are made.
I told them and read to them how God has a perfect plan for how we use our bodies and that sometimes sin keeps us from God’s original plan. I told them about some of the art they might see.
Although they may not understand everything, I’m so glad we are continuing the discussion. I’m learning. They are learning. Step by step. We applied some of this today as we visited the Ufizzi Museum and the Gallery of the Academy. There is amazing art in these places.
This is “David” by Michelangelo. I believe this is David before he slung the stones at Goliath. We sat in front of this for a few minutes and admired how the artist did an amazing job of sculpting such detail in the body. The ribs. The tendons behind his knees. His hands. His toes. The proportions. And it’s so big!
“Adoration of the Child” by Gherardo Delle Notti. Nathan pointed out to me that when you are looking at paintings, it’s interesting to figure out where the light is coming from. In this painting all the light is coming from Jesus. “Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.’”- John 8:12 (ESV)
“The Baptism of Christ” by Andrea del Verroocchio Leonardo da Vinci. Anna is writing a biography book report about Leonardo da Vinci, so it was really cool to see some of his work in person.
We climbed to the top of the Duomo today! I was a little nervous about doing this because climbing the bell tower was pretty hard. I’m not sure why, but this one actually felt a little easier than the bell tower! Yay! The Duomo is 463 steps. The bell tower is 414 steps.
We had to celebrate this experience with gelato!
One of my favorite things about this trip is spending time with my kids and getting to see them in new ways. One thing I’ve really enjoyed this trip is that pretty much every time Naomi sees a dog she says, almost in a whisper, “Hey, Mom! Look at that cute dog!” She loves dogs! I’m not really a dog person. I love that she is and I want to be more of a dog person because of her. I love that she shows me the dogs and that she wants to draw dogs. Often, she tells me what she wants to be when she grows up, and it changes a lot! Tonight before we turned off the lights, she said, “Mom, I know what I want to be when I grow up! I want to draw dogs!” Then she showed me this drawing. You are such a wonderful dog drawer, sweet girl! I’m so proud of her and her dreams!