Stoned in Florence

Today, among other things, we went to the Opificio delle Pietre Dure, which was originally a workshop established by the Medici for creating inlaid stone work (like that in the Medici Chapels).  It is now a Museum devoted to the craft of creating images with stones.  The craftsmanship on display is astonishing, with tiny little fragments of different colored stones being used to create very realistic images.  Even Vera, who generally doesn't like anything "natural", was amazed.

This image, for example was creating only with stones:

Here is another, a landscape, with a lapis lazuli sky.

Here, a more primitive example:

In other cases, artists would take an existing stone as a kind of background and paint a few figures on them:

Upstairs, there was a display of the kinds of stones used; the Medici were obtaining precious stones from all over the world, although Italy itself is a major source for the stones.

Needless to say, there was virtually no one else there.   Who needs the Uffizi?