149 Paintings You Really Should See in Europe — Venice and Florence by Julian Porter

Author:Julian Porter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dundurn Press
Published: 2013-08-14T00:00:00+00:00

72. Adoration of the Magi

Botticelli, Sandro, c. 1475

Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Photo: Scala / Art Resource, NY

Botticelli has a startling Adoration of the Magi, which he completed when he was only twenty-seven years old. It is a Renaissance parade of gossip, show, and inattentiveness towards the supposed stars, the Virgin and child. Expensive attire, theatrical posing, whispered sarcasm — welcome to the Bourse.

It is surmised that the three submissive kings are the Medici — Cosimo the Elder, Piero the Gouty, and Cosimo’s son, Giovanni. Their elegant attire sparkles. The work was commissioned by a stockbroker, Euasparre de Laura, he being the white-haired man in the middle right staring at the viewer.

The Medici were the bankers of Florence, the city that invented the florin, the precursor of the euro. Then, as now, the moneymen spun a web of commerce and credit far and wide, from Constantinople to London.

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