Firenze

I would walk through the cold nights of Florence across the Ponte Vecchio, knowing that on the other side, in the Loggia of the Mercato Nuovo, a street musician with long blond hair would be singing “Stand By Me”, and that I would be mantled by the aroma and warmth of the chestnut sellers.

The night windows of the camera and photography shops at that time were displaying the great novelty of autofocus cameras, while I wore a Zenit camera that I had bought in Moscow for a few dollars around my neck.

Only three hours of travel separate me geographically from my current life in Milan and Florence, but the trip back to the golden days of my life there, where I lived so intensely in the jewel of Tuscany, is far away in the past.

Borges used to speak about Proust’s concept that what we really miss is the time associated with places, not the places themselves. It is the experiences, not the places, that matter, but these experiences make the places special to us.

Piazzale degli Uffizzi is a scenic space unified by telescoping columns that frame the Arno on one side and the imposing Palazzo Vecchio with its tower on the other. The 28 marble statues of illustrious Tuscans display their eternal grandeur and seem to me more imposing and resplendent than in those days when I felt I was capturing them on 35 mm film. I used to send the photo slides showing the artists working under the statutes to my father, something I can no longer do because he is no longer around to receive them.

I remember the happy times of my life when I used to walk around Florence, but now I have forgotten many of its streets and I get lost in its “vicoli”, its narrow alleys, trying to reach Santa Croce as I used to.

I return to Florence today and realize that it still seduces me as it did in those distant years. I understand why I was so in love with its small perimeter from the bustling San Lorenzo district to the small Santa Croce district within which is held the strongest concentration of art known throughout the world.

Florence, the cradle of the Renaissance on the banks of the Arno River, an enchanting and irresistible city, where you can party with art. An absolutely artistic city, the reference point, the model for the new human race emerging from the Middle Ages.

One image that was always etched in my memory during all these years when I remembered Florence is the profile of the Column of Justice against the imposing Palazzo Spini Ferroni. Today I return to this square, Santa Trinità, and I realize that I never really left Florence, that the aesthetic of beauty that I discovered in the rest of the world I owe to this unique place, the cradle of art, protected by gentle hills, Florentia, Florence.

In the waters of the river Arno I started a long journey, which now so many years later is reflected in each of its moments and its details in the waters of this same river.