Florentine Museums, What a Passion! Meet Bruno Tempestini

He arrives right on schedule on the appointed day to visit one of “his” museums: peaked cap, a scarf knotted at the neck like a true bohémien, a padded jacket in winter, a checked shirt in summer; and then the ever-present shoulder bag, from which — as if from a magician’s hat — he pulls photocopied pages from one of his many books, or little slips of paper bearing the “cultural gems” he loves to hand out to the museum attendants, by now his friends. We’re talking about Bruno Tempestini — born in 1942 — the visitor par excellence, the super season-pass holder of the Florentine galleries who, for the past fifteen years, sets out every afternoon from Montale — the town in the province of Pistoia where he was born and raised — to follow a route mapped out across seven days.

In his chat with FUL, he revealed that every day of the week corresponds to one or more of the museums of our beautiful Florence: for Monday he has chosen the Museo del Novecento and then, if there’s time left over, he “pops in” to Palazzo Strozzi; Tuesday he spends at Palazzo Vecchio; Wednesday he visits the Uffizi and sometimes pairs it with the Bargello; Thursday is reserved for the Museo degli Innocenti, the Accademia, and the Museo Archeologico; Friday he generally spends at the Cappella Brancacci and the Museo Bardini; and finally Sunday is the turn of the Santa Maria Novella complex, and from there he heads to the Cappelle Medicee.

The first to spot him arriving are the front desk staff, and word quickly spreads: “Bruno’s here!!” With discretion and respect for those who are working, this singular guest senses when it’s the right moment to linger for a joke and when, because there are too many tourists around, it’s better not to — and he slips inside without stopping.

The fact is that every time, Bruno brings a gust of cheer to the people who work in the museums, breaking, for a moment, the monotony of long days spent watching over the galleries — interrupting the routine of those at the ticket desk, those handing out audio guides, or those assigned to the bookshop, who have to deal with visitors who are sometimes a touch demanding.

Beloved by everyone who works in tourism, Bruno Tempestini is always welcomed with delight, and it’s a pleasure to seek out his opinion on one of the exhibitions currently on in Florence, on the most heavily criticized contemporary artist, on the new arrangement of the galleries in a given museum, on the (often) eccentric contemporary installations scattered around the historic center… In short, who better than him has a finger on the pulse of how Florentine culture is moving?

Ironic, sharp, at times irreverent, this toscanaccio (a fondly gruff, quintessential Tuscan) always takes his leave with a quip along the lines of: “Now I’m off to see the mummies” (a nod to the Museo Archeologico), or “I’m heading up to see how Domenico’s doing…” (referring to the great painting by Ghirlandaio on the third floor of the Museo degli Innocenti), or even: “See you later — I’m off to check whether they’ve put underwear on the David!” — and here an inevitable laugh breaks out at the thought of the famous nude in the Galleria dell’Accademia sporting a pair of boxers…

Bruno kept everyone on tenterhooks when, for a long stretch, he failed to turn up for his usual appointment with the Florentine museums. This past November he had been hit while crossing at the pedestrian lines (for the second time!) right in front of his home. Fortunately, finally back on his feet after four months of convalescence, he has returned: a real joy to see that the nasty accident hadn’t dulled his spark in the slightest!

Always in good spirits, Bruno Tempestini is undeniably an eccentric, “a character” as they say in Florence… but that’s only his manner; in reality, behind the mask he has created for himself lies a boundless culture — and not only in art (both classical and contemporary) and music (as a young man he trained as a tenor with esteemed teachers in Florence, Bologna, and Mantua), but also in history, with a particular focus on archaeology. Thanks to his self-taught studies, his own research, and his hands-on work “in the field,” in the early 1980s he earned the title of Honorary Inspector for the Archaeological Heritage Superintendency of Tuscany.

“My first archaeological discovery dates back to 1982, when I noticed, next to the excavation at a building site, a pile of bricks and materials that struck me at once as Roman. I immediately called the Superintendency of Florence, which, after an inspection, confirmed the value of the finds, which were then catalogued and taken into their stores. From then on I made other important discoveries throughout the surrounding area, which helped reconstruct the Etruscan presence in the territory between Prato and Pistoia and earned me the role of archaeological inspector.”

And how did your passion for art come about?

“It began very early, around the age of seventeen. Together with two friends my own age, in summer we’d take our bikes to the Villa Medicea di Poggio a Caiano, or to Florence on Sundays (when the museums were free) to visit the Uffizi, the Cappelle Medicee, and more. One of them, who later became a professor of paleontology at the University of Siena, would pass me his study books (most often books on art) along with precious advice. That’s where my strong attraction to beauty was born, and the desire to keep going deeper.”

So you’ve been visiting our historic center for a very long time. How much has Florence changed over all these years?

“It’s changed a great deal. There are too many cars (even in the restricted-traffic zone) and the sidewalks are dangerously uneven. What’s more, you used to be able to walk in the center; now it’s practically impossible because of the crowds. Ponte Vecchio will collapse sooner or later under the weight of all those tourists! The museums are packed — and yet finding myself in the midst of this crowd that comes from every corner of the world gives me, someone who has never been abroad, the chance to observe the variety of so many nationalities, the different features of people’s faces, and that enriches me enormously.”

You have the privilege of contemplating the artworks in our museums countless times; the gallery attendants often ask whether you haven’t grown tired of seeing them…

“The thing is, I don’t see them the way they are, or the way others see them; I have a world all my own, bound up with the ideas of form, color, and music. And when someone asks me, ‘What about thought?’ — leave that aside, I say, that’s another matter. When I look at a beautiful painting (and therefore a harmony of form and color), I’m happy. Then I reflect, and I think of the moment when an artist creates a work of art, which, in my view, is as though it generated a genuine ‘cosmic current’ — the same one I feel running through me when I walk among people in the streets of Florence, or when I look at a work of art and take it in, storing it up…”

Is it true that your home is overflowing with paintings, sculptures, and art volumes, with which you’d like to create a museum open to everyone? Would you tell us about it?

“It’s my greatest dream: to find a place that could house my collection. Every time I’ve come to Florence over the years, I’ve gone to some workshop in the center or to a market to buy an art catalogue or a painting, always for just a few euros. Today I own a thousand or so art volumes and as many paintings — both small and large — mostly signed by so-called minor or practically unknown artists who, in all likelihood, will never have the chance to make themselves known, to receive praise or prizes.

You see, I’d like to donate this large collection of mine and make it accessible, to show that they exist too — a world of simple people united by the passion for making art. I could picture it perfectly in the (currently unused) rooms above the Montale-Agliana station, finally launching a program to revive this mid-19th-century building and turn it into a cultural center, a space to host temporary exhibitions alongside my whole collection of volumes and paintings — including the archaeological finds in storage (we’re talking about artifacts ranging from the Acheulean period to some Renaissance ceramics) that to this day have never been shown.”

Bruno is old-school: no computer, and social media is out of the question; his phone is an old “clamshell” model. Still, as a photography enthusiast, he owns a smartphone that he uses solely to snap photos of details in paintings or of the curious poses of the sculptures on display in the museums, which he then shows, delighted, to his attendant friends. We would have loved to learn much more about Bruno Tempestini (listening to him is a real pleasure), but in the end we chose to leave intact that aura of curiosity that comes and goes with him each time he shows up for his appointment with Florentine culture.

Cover: Bruno Tempestini in the Ghirlandaio room inside the picture gallery of the Museo degli Innocenti

Photos by Paola Bolletti.