The Shrine of Santa Maria della Steccata is a Greek-cross design Renaissance church in central Parma, Italy. The name derives from the fence or steccato used to corral the numerous devotees who visited a venerated image of the Madonna. A Nursing Madonna is enshrined within, crowned on 27 May 1601 by a Marian devotee, Fray Giacomo di Forli of the Capuchin order.
The Palazzo Comunale , also known as the Palazzo del Popolo of San Gimignano has been the seat of the civic authority in the comune since the 13th century. It is located on the Piazza del Duomo close to the Collegiate Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The building and Collegiate Church are at the heart of the medieval town, and are part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the "Historic Centre of San Gimignano".The building contains important fresco decorations by Memmo di Filippuccio, Lippo Memmi and others, a museum and a gallery with works of the Florentine and Sienese schools of art - including paintings by Coppo di Marcovaldo, Lippo Memmi, Benozzo Gozzoli, Filippino Lippi, Il Sodoma and Pinturicchio.
The Oratory of San Bernardino is an oratory in the city of Perugia in Italy, located on piazza San Francesco next to the basilica of San Francesco al Prato. Dedicated to saint Bernardino of Siena and completed in 1452, it is notable for its 1457-61 multi-coloured façade covered in reliefs by the Renaissance artist Agostino di Duccio.
The Quirinal Palace is a historic building in Rome, Italy, one of the three current official residences of the President of the Italian Republic, together with Villa Rosebery in Naples and the Tenuta di Castelporziano, an estate on the outskirts of Rome, some 25 klm from the centre of the city. It is located on the Quirinal Hill, the highest of the seven hills of Rome in an area colloquially called Monte Cavallo. It has served as residence for thirty Popes, four Kings of Italy and twelve presidents of the Italian Republic.
The Quirinal Palace was selected by Napoleon to be his residence par excellence as Emperor. However his permanence never took place because of the French defeat in 1814 and the subsequent European Restoration.The palace extends for an area of 110,500 square metres and is the eleventh-largest palace in the world in terms of area, some twenty times the area of the White House.
Palazzo Farnese or Farnese Palace is one of the most important High Renaissance palaces in Rome. Owned by the Italian Republic, it was given to the French government in 1936 for a period of 99 years, and currently serves as the French embassy in Italy.
First designed in 1517 for the Farnese family, the building expanded in size and conception when Alessandro Farnese became Pope Paul III in 1534, to designs by Antonio da Sangallo the Younger. Its building history involved some of the most prominent Italian architects of the 16th century, including Michelangelo, Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola and Giacomo della Porta.
At the end of the 16th century, the important fresco cycle of The Loves of the Gods in the Farnese Gallery was carried out by the Bolognese painter Annibale Carracci, marking the beginning of two divergent trends in painting during the 17th century, the Roman High Baroque and Classicism. The famous Farnese sculpture collection, now in the National Archeological Museum of Naples, as well as other Farnese collections, now mostly in Capodimonte Museum in Naples, were accommodated in the palace.
Piazza Barberini is a large piazza in the centro storico or city center of Rome, Italy and situated on the Quirinal Hill. It was created in the 16th century but many of the surrounding buildings have subsequently been rebuilt.
The current appellation was given in 1625 when it was named after the Palazzo Barberini, the substantial Baroque palace built in an elevated position on the south side of the piazza for the Barberini. Originally, there was a large entrance gateway to the palace designed by the Baroque painter and architect Pietro da Cortona on the south east corner of the piazza but this was demolished to make way for the construction of a new road in the 19th century. However, its appearance is known from engravings and early photographs of the piazza.At the centre of the piazza is the Fontana del Tritone or Triton Fountain sculpted by Bernini. Another fountain, the Fontana delle Api , also by Bernini is in the nearby Via Vittorio Veneto but it has been reconstructed somewhat arbitrarily following its removal from its previous position on the corner of a palace where the Piazza Barberini meets the Via Sistina.Until the 18th century, unknown human corpses were displayed here for public identification. Between 1632 and 1822 an antique obelisk stood here; it was transferred to Villa Medici.
