A landmark exhibition at Florence’s Palazzo Pitti will bring together more than 100 works from the extraordinary art collection of Lorenzo the Magnificent, including, for the first time in history, all three panels of Paolo Uccello’s Battle of San Romano, reunited from the Uffizi, National Gallery in London and Louvre in Paris.
Florence is set to revisit one of the most remarkable chapters in Renaissance art history with Magnifico 1492, a major exhibition dedicated to Lorenzo de’ Medici, the celebrated statesman, cultural patron and leading figure of the Medici dynasty. Running from 3 December 2026 to 1 March 2027, the exhibition will take place at the Treasury of the Grand Dukes on the ground floor of Palazzo Pitti, bringing together more than 100 works that offer an unprecedented insight into the breadth and ambition of Lorenzo’s personal art collection.
Organised by the Uffizi Galleries, the exhibition draws on extensive scholarly and curatorial research to reconstruct the extraordinary collection assembled by the Medici family and housed in their historic residence on Via Larga in Florence, now Palazzo Medici Riccardi. Using the inventory compiled in 1492, the year of Lorenzo’s death, as its starting point, Magnifico 1492 explores how the collection was originally arranged within the palace, while examining the artistic, intellectual, political and philosophical interests that shaped Medici collecting practices.
More than an exhibition of Renaissance masterpieces, Magnifico 1492 offers a fascinating portrait of a family whose cultural ambitions helped define Florence’s position at the centre of European intellectual and artistic life. Paintings and sculptures will be displayed alongside vases, precious gems, cameos, coins, illuminated manuscripts and maps, revealing the extraordinary diversity of Lorenzo’s interests and the collecting culture of the Renaissance.
Among the most significant highlights is an historic reunion of Paolo Uccello’s celebrated three-panel painting cycle, The Battle of San Romano. For the first time, the three monumental panels will be brought together in Florence, reunited from their current homes at the Uffizi Galleries, the National Gallery in London and the Louvre in Paris. Originally part of the Medici collection, the paintings depict the dramatic battle of 1432 between Florentine and Sienese forces. Their reunion will allow visitors to experience the composition as it would have been seen in the Medici residence, offering a rare opportunity to appreciate Uccello’s distinctive combination of Renaissance perspective, elaborate detail and theatrical representation of warfare.
Other exceptional loans include the gilded bronze Spiritello (Sprite), created by a sculptor close to Donatello and originally conceived as a decorative feature of the fountain in the courtyard of Lorenzo’s Palazzo Medici residence. On loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the sculpture offers a glimpse into the refined decorative objects that formed part of the Medici household.
Another major highlight is an exquisite illuminated manuscript of Francesco Petrarch’s Triumphs, lent by the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris. Personally commissioned by Lorenzo, the manuscript was copied, illuminated and bound for his private use, reflecting his profound appreciation of classical literature, humanist scholarship and the art of the book.
Commenting on the exhibition, Simone Verde, Director of the Uffizi Galleries, said that the project offers an opportunity to reconsider the collecting practices of the early Medici through new and previously unpublished research. The exhibition also examines the political vision underpinning the dynasty’s cultural patronage, revealing how the acquisition and display of exceptional works of art helped consolidate and extend Medici power and influence across Italy and beyond.
Born in 1449, Lorenzo di Piero de’ Medici, universally known as Lorenzo the Magnificent, remains one of the defining figures of the Italian Renaissance. A skilled diplomat and statesman, he was equally celebrated for his commitment to literature, philosophy and the visual arts. During his rule, Florence became a magnet for some of the most influential thinkers and artists of the fifteenth century, including Angelo Poliziano, Marsilio Ficino and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, alongside artistic talents such as Sandro Botticelli and the young Michelangelo.
Lorenzo’s legacy extended far beyond his personal collection. His patronage helped nurture the intellectual and creative environment that established Florence as a leading centre of Renaissance culture, while the Medici family’s extraordinary collecting tradition would continue to shape the city’s artistic identity for generations.
With its exceptional international loans, newly researched historical context and unprecedented reunion of Uccello’s Battle of San Romano, Magnifico 1492 promises to be a major cultural event for Florence. By reconstructing the collection at the moment of Lorenzo’s death, the exhibition offers a rare opportunity to encounter the Renaissance through the eyes of one of its most influential patrons.
Magnifico 1492 is presented by Uffizi Galleries at the Treasury of the Grand Dukes, Palazzo Pitti in Florence, Italy from 3 December 2026 – 1 March 2027. Find more information here.
