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PIENZA's MISSING STATUES:  Insight from a Renaissance Puzzle into a Pope's World

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I
n August 1462  
Pope Pius II, 
Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, inaugurated the new cathedral in his rebuilt renaissance town of Pienza.   We still admire his works over five centuries later, strolling through his piazza -- one of the most beautiful in Italy, and one of the most complete: a little world of its own. 

What if we could we see the pope’s works through renaissance eyes?  

 Most of us today require more time and consideration, or more clues, to appreciate the spiritual significances and metaphors or visual puns embodied in the material cathedral and its facade artistry, as they preside over the pope’s piazza.   Yet the clues are there.  

Beginning with a mysterious absence glimpsed in the cathedral facade, pieces of a puzzle are assembled from evidence carved in stone, from the extraordinary testimony of Pope Pius himself, and his legacies to Pienza -- with intriguing twists in the tale!

This is the short story of an exploration into Pienza’s and Pope Pius’s  renaissance world.   

                                           ABSTRACT  Here                                                                   PREVIEW  Here
                                                                    And for more from the book here and here.

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NOW
AVAILABLE !!


     PREVIEW Here
with 'Contents' and More

        BUY it Here


76 pages with 67 colour illustrations integrated into the text, and three-colour fonts inspired by early Italian renaissance printed books;
10 x 7.5 in/ 25.3 x 19 cm

© Andrew Johnson 2011
RenaissanceInTuscany.com text and images are copyright Andrew T.W. Johnson except where otherwise credited.