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traditional crafts revisited Past Perfect
[Maddalena Delli]
Oltrarno means, literally, 'beyond the Arno', a term which has come to stand for the ancient city district of Santo Spirito on the left bank of the river. Since the best known monuments and two thirds of the historical city lie on the right bank, Oltrarno is still fairly unknown to the most. Indeed, it does have plenty of art treasures which would be well worth a visit to Florence in their own right: let us just mention the magnificent Pitti Palace, the church of Santo Spirito by Brunelleschi and the Brancacci Chapel with Masaccio's frescoes. But besides all that, Oltrarno is the one area in Florence where you can still catch a genuine glimpse of the city's past. Comparatively unspoilt by commercial exploitation, mostly unknown to the hoards of occasional tourists, this part of Florence preserves – in a maze of narrow streets and small squares – its original and fine tradition of handicrafts, whose skills are handed down from one generation to the next since countless centuries. Peer into any of these workshops and you will often witness scenes which may be not very much unlike those of a Renaissance 'bottega' where our greatest artists were trained as goldsmiths, painters or wood carvers in their younger days.
In order to promote and encourage the knowledge of this area's hidden treasures, a local Committee now in its eighth year of activity has been organising a number of events. The programme, known as Diladdarno (a variant of 'Oltrarno', meaning exactly the same) spans the whole year, but has its core in a spring festival which this time is held in May from Saturday 10th to Sunday 18th with art and crafts exhibitions, street markets, fairs, guided visits and more. The full program will be published in our events section.
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http://www.mega.it/eng/egui/monu/sspir.htm
http://www.mega.it/eng/egui/pers/fibru.htm
http://www.mega.it/eng/egui/pers/masac.htm