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Sansepolcro
37km
(23 miles) NE of Arezzo; 15km (9
miles) N of Città di Castello;
122km (76 miles) E of Florence;
240km (149 miles) N of Rome.
Sense Polcro started out as a small village that was
established in the year one
thousand AD. The town got its name
from bits of the Holy Sepulcher
that pilgrims to the Holy Land had
brought back. They called the town
Borgo San Sepolcro. Tourists
though, do not come here for that
reason; in fact the only tourists
who do come here are those who are
interested in the art of Piero
Della Francesca. This artist was
born here in 1420 AD.
A painter of the early Renaissance, Piero took the
fascination for perspective of
Florentine masters Masaccio and
Paolo Uccello and mixed it with
the ghostly beauty of the Umbrian
school to create a new and
poignant style all his own.
Piero's figures are at the same
time examples of precision
Euclidean geometry and that of
expressive naturalism. His
backgrounds, including those of
the countryside, are stunning
successes of architectural
intensity. The school of modern
painters is so fascinated with his
work that the cities preserving
these paintings has become known
as the Piero della Francesca
Trail, a must visit road for
art lovers. Piero's wrote two
essays, On the Five Regular
Bodies and On Perspective
in Painting. These books were
written when he was older and his
eyesight was failing, they set the
rules for his world of perspective
and logic. The books described the
human body as a geometric design
of perfect proportions, and over
the years became cumpulsory
reading for every Renaissance
artist. He died near his hometown
in 1492. Piero is revered here,
and everyone seems to know
something about him. But better
than knowing something about him
is to just look through the glass
window of the museum's Piero room
and peer at the Piero della
Francesca masterpieces inside for
a few moments.
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