Architectural · 2026

“Florence Cathedral Sensation”

The cathedral of Florence dissolving into wash — the ochre dome above, the façade below barely more than a scaffold of ink lines.

Details

TitleFlorence Cathedral Sensation

PlaceFlorence, Italy

Year2026

CategoryArchitectural

Dimensions23 × 31 cm

TechniqueWatercolor on Paper

Palette of the work

Request information

This piece is part of my collection. Originals will soon be available to buy online — write to me in the meantime.

The subject

A Sensation of the Duomo

Florence Cathedral — the Duomo — let loose in colour: the façade and Brunelleschi’s dome drawn in ink and then struck with a burst of pigment. One of my ’Sensation’ sheets.

Santa Maria del Fiore is the heart of Florence: Arnolfo’s marble front, Giotto’s bell-tower beside it, and over everything the great red dome. It is almost too much to draw soberly — so here I didn’t try.

The ink holds the architecture; the watercolour explodes around and over it, warm and cool at once — the way the building hits you when you first come round the corner into the piazza.

It is a sensation, not a survey: the shock of the Duomo rather than its dimensions.

Church: Santa Maria del Fiore
City: Florence
Dome: Brunelleschi’s
Series: Sensations
Format: 23 × 31 cm

The marble façade and bell-tower of Florence Cathedral — The Duomo of Florence — Arnolfo’s marble façade and Giotto’s bell-tower.Photo: Mайкл Гиммельфарб — CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

A detail of the carved and mosaic façade of Florence Cathedral — Marble and mosaic — the façade too rich to draw soberly.Photo: Oakenchips — CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Duomo doesn’t arrive quietly — so I met it with a whole box of colour.

Ink for the dome, the lantern and the ranks of marble; flooded colour for everything the eye can’t take in at once.

There is a sober grey drawing of the dome elsewhere in my work; this is its exact opposite, and just as true.