The Uffizi Gallery is the most visited museum in Italy and for good reason: it houses a great concentration of absolute masterpieces, particularly of the Renaissance painting for which Florence became famous around the world. The Gallery is located on the first and second floor of the large building erected between 1560 and 1580, designed by Giorgio Vasari to serve as headquarters of the administrative offices of the Tuscan State. It housed paintings and sculptures of the Medici collection and was open to a restricted form of the public already in the sixteenth century.

Visitors to the Uffizi can observe masterpieces in a roughly chronological order beginning with Medieval painting and the room dedicated to the large altarpieces of Giotto and Cimabue. The visit continues with Renaissance Tuscan painters Piero della Francesca, Paolo Uccello and Filippo Lippi. A room is dedicated to Botticelli’s famous Venus and Primavera paintings. The museum path continues through works of the 15th century in Siena, the Veneto (think Mantegna, Titian, Bellini, Correggio and Canaletto), Emilia Romagna and Lombardy. Moving into the later Renaissance we find masterpieces by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Michelangelo’s Doni Tondo. 

The collections of German, Dutch, and Flemish paintings are also important and include Durer, Rembrandt, Rubens, and Goya in newly arranged rooms. Other collections include tThe Medici’s collection of ancient statues and busts and the Department of Prints and Drawings, which occasionally hosts special exhibitions of a selection of items. The self-portrait collection opened in 2023 with 12 rooms to permanently display over 200 works by artists over 600 years.