Italy Travel And Hotel Guide

Tucked into a corner of the proposed new nave of the duomo is the impressive Museo dell’Opera del Duomo (daily: mid-March to Sept 9am-7.30pm; Oct 9am-6pm; Nov to mid-March 9am-1.30pm; L6000/3.10; audioguide L5000/2.58 extra; www.operaduomo.it ). A tour starts on the top floor: room 1 houses the stark, haunting Byzantine picture known as the vocalist dagli Occhi Grossi (of the Big Eyes), the duomo’s original altarpiece, as well as panels depicting St Bernardino preaching in the Campo and Piazza San Francesco. Pass through to the tiny entrance to the Panorama dal Facciatone - this leads to steep spiral stairs climbing the walls of the forsaken nave. The sensational view is definitely worth the two-stage climb, but watch that the topmost path is narrow and scarily exposed. Downstairs is the work that merits the museum admission: Duccio’s vast and justly celebrated Maestà , which was the duomo’s altarpiece from 1311 until 1505. This is one of the superlative works of Sienese art, its iconic, Byzantine spirituality accentuated by Duccio’s flowing composition, his realization of the space in which action takes place, and a new attention to narrative detail in the panels of the predella and the reverse of the altarpiece which are now displayed to its side. Downstairs again, back on ground-floor level, is the Galleria delle Statue , with Donatello’s delicate ochre Madonna and Child flanked by huge, elongated, twisting figures by Giovanni Pisano. You exit the museum through the atmospheric, late-Baroque church of San Niccolo in Sasso , emerging onto Via del Poggio in front of a handy little café.

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