Fresco of Dante Alighieri in the restaurant.
I cannot recall having previously discussed a restaurant on this website. But then again Fishing Lab in the Via del Proconsolo in Florence, right next to the Bargello, is not just any restaurant. Yes, the quality of the food you get there is excellent, but it was the unique ambiance that really made my day. The restaurant has found accommodation in the former headquarters of the Guild of Judges and Notaries in the city, the Palazzo dell’Arte dei Giudici e Notai. Between the thirteenth and mid-sixteenth centuries this guild made use of the building and had its walls and vaults decorated with beautiful frescoes, which were later unfortunately whitewashed. Sometimes this ensures preservation, but in this case the frescoes emerged from behind the plaster heavily damaged and very incomplete. According to this source the owner of Fishing Lab subsequently spent at least 400,000 euros on restoration of the frescoes, and then another 600,000 euros on protective measures, so that the guests in the restaurant could enjoy them while simultaneously enjoying their lunch or dinner.
I would probably never have visited Fishing Lab had it not been for a golden tip from a kind employee of the Museo Horne. Unfortunately I did not have the time back then to eat at the restaurant, but in 2024 I was back in Florence and there were plenty of opportunities to enjoy the combination of delicious pasta and beautiful art. The frescoes that have been preserved were painted between roughly the 1360s and the start of the fifteenth century. Some of them were rediscovered in 1880, and more in the 1950s, but it was not until 2004 before the restoration work was completed. On the vault of the large open hall, which served as the reception room of the guild, we find a large fresco of Florence as the new Jerusalem. Florence is depicted as a circular city. Apart from the symbols of the city and the Guelph party we also see the coats of arms of the four quarters into which Florence was divided. These quartieri were the successors of the sestieri and date from 1343. It follows that the fresco was in any case painted after 1343. It also contains the symbols of the 21 guilds in Florence, the seven Arti Maggiori, five Arti Mediane and nine Arti Minori. The Guild of Judges and Notaries was a member of the first group, that of the “major guilds”.
Fresco with Rhetoric, Logic and Grammar.
The four lunettes of the large hall were also decorated with frescoes. Unfortunately only fragments survive, so it is not always easy to interpret the scenes. We for instance see three women on as many thrones, but the third woman is unfortunately lost. The women are thought to be personifications of Rhetoric, Logic and Grammar, skills that were extremely important for judges and notaries. The saint in a white habit that we find in another lunette is possibly Ivo Hélory (1253-1303) from Brittany, who was canonised in 1347. He is considered the patron saint of lawyers and a protector of the poor. I personally think the man is indeed Saint Ivo: an image of this saint in the building of the Judges and Notaries makes perfect sense. To the right of him we see five faces of citizens that certainly do not belong to the upper classes.
Saint Ivo Hélory (?) and five citizens.
Five faces.
The last lunette once featured a gallery of poets and writers. It was reportedly commissioned by Coluccio Salutati (ca. 1332-1406), who served as chancellor of Florence between 1375 and his death in 1406. Unfortunately the series of portraits survives in a fragmentary state only, but thanks to extensive research in the city archives the gallery can be reconstructed fairly well. The famous Florentine poet Dante Alighieri (ca. 1265-1321) was among the men depicted, and so were his fellow poets Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374), Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) and Zanobi da Strada (1312-1361). These great men were certainly painted after 1375, the year that Boccaccio died and Coluccio Salutati became chancellor. In 1406 a portrait of Coluccio was added, together with a portrait of the poet Claudius Claudianus from the fourth and fifth centuries. It was long thought that Claudianus was from Florence, but this proved to be a misconception: he was actually born in Alexandria in present-day Egypt. Later in the fifteenth century the humanists Leonardo Bruni (1370-1444), Poggio Bracciolini (1380-1459) and Giannozzo Manetti (1396-1459) were added to this gallery of giants, although unfortunately we do not know where exactly they were painted.
It is saddening to see how little of the aforementioned frescoes has been preserved. Just two heads are still visible, but this is compensated by the fact that one of the heads is a portrait of Dante, the author of the famous poem the Divine Comedy (see the first image of this post). According to various sources and also according to the restaurant itself we are looking at the oldest known portrait of the poet, painted some fifty years after his death in 1321. However, there are certainly older portraits of Dante in Florence. Just think of the portrait of the poet from ca. 1333-1337 in the Cappella della Maddalena of the Bargello and his presumed portrait in the Cappella Strozzi di Mantova in the church of Santa Maria Novella from ca. 1360. Dante is, in a way, the male counterpart of Cleopatra: for some reason people always mention his nose. The information about the frescoes in Fishing Lab stresses that the poet does not yet have his characteristic aquiline nose here. His nose looks pretty normal in the chapel of the Bargello as well, but in the Cappella Strozzi di Mantova it is indeed rather hooked (if the person depicted is indeed Dante).
Fusillone and polpo.
The big question is of course which painters were responsible for all these frescoes. Documents show that Jacopo di Cione (ca. 1325-1399) decorated the vault in 1366. That year also saw the death of his brother Nardo di Cione, who had worked on the frescoes in the Cappella Strozzi di Mantova, including the presumed portrait of Dante. It would have been appropriate if Jacopo di Cione had made the portrait of the poet for the Guild of Judges and Notaries, but experts tend to believe that the frescoes in the lunettes were made by a painter from the circle of Niccolò di Pietro Gerini (died 1415). The available sources furthermore prove that the portraits of Coluccio Salutati and Claudianus were made in 1406 by Ambrogio di Baldese (ca. 1352-1429), a fairly unknown painter from Florence. Andrea del Castagno (ca. 1421-1457) and Piero del Pollaiuolo (1443-1496) are said to have later added the now lost portraits of the great humanists. Assuming that these were not painted until after their deaths, the former presumably painted Leonardo Bruni and the latter Poggio Bracciolini and Giannozzo Manetti. After all, when Bracciolini and Manetti passed away in 1459, Andrea del Castagno had been dead for two years.
One would almost forget, but the food at Fishing Lab is also amazing! I took the fusillone and polpo (photo above) and thoroughly enjoyed the rich flavours. I also sent a picture of the dish to my aunt, who once confused pollo (chicken) and polpo (octopus). It is apparently possible to go to the basement of the restaurant for dessert and view some remains of Roman Florence (Florentia), but I regretfully had to skip dessert because I was once again expected at the airport. There can be no doubt that I will return to Fishing Lab someday though!