Global Life: A Tribute to Art

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We made our way up the grand staircase under gold-filigreed FE-DVX engraved lintels (the duke, it seems, had a little P. Diddy in him) and began exploring from the top down. The palace doubles as the Galleria Nazionale delle Marche, and the paintings within are a reminder that Renaissance art was heavily religious. But the paintings on the first floor lean toward the secular. One in particular, Ideal City, belongs near the top of any list of great Renaissance works. The painting, by an unknown artist, is a dream of a city so pure and precise that the creator actually left people out of it. The pictures at the overstuffed, overcrowded Uffizi in Florence may be better, but at the Palazzo Ducal you move at your own pace or relax on one of the centuries-old marble window seats and actually get to know the images. Like all meaningful brushes with history, visiting the Palazzo Ducale plays constantly with your sense of time. Look at Ideal City or peer down the seemingly endless spiral staircase in one of the towers, and you feel the chasm between past and present. Then you turn a corner into the duke's study, and the centuries disappear. From eye level to the floor, the room is a series of wood panels with exquisite inlaid images of Federico's favorite things--musical instruments, suits of armor and loads of books. Above, there are 28 portraits arranged in two rows. The lower row is devoted to great religious figures; the upper pays tribute to thinkers and writers. The room is so lovingly and casually preserved, you never doubt that a great man once passed happy hours here.

The wonders of the palace are fairly ceaseless. There's a massive subterranean layer where wines were stored and baths taken. Just off the duke's study are two alcoves: the Temple of the Muses and the Chapel of Forgiveness. (Between his battlefield deeds and the generally agreed-upon fact that Federico was complicit in his half-brother's rubout, there was much to absolve.) I sat on the floor in both rooms and absorbed the feel of history, whistling to hear the little echoes and gently rubbing my hands over the stone floors. Maybe I was being a tad presumptuous, but I don't think the duke would have minded.