Farewell to Pina Ragionieri, Michelangelo scholar and longtime president of Casa Buonarroti

Scholar Pina Ragionieri, a specialist on Michelangelo’s work, passed away today in Florence at the age of 92. She passed away at Santa Maria Nuova Hospital, where she had been admitted last Jan. 6 following an illness.

Born in Florence on Feb. 23, 1926, Pina Ragionieri had graduated in modern Italian philology from the University of Florence with Attilio Momigliano, and her career had begun as a contributor to newspapers and magazines (her pieces for Piero Calamandrei’s Ponte and articles for newspapers such as Paese Sera and L’Unità are particularly remembered ). From 1954 to 1975 she worked for Casa Editrice Sansoni, editing series of the classics of Italian and foreign literature and also working as a translator (she edited translations of great authors such as Herman Melville and Henry Fielding). Later, her focus had shifted to art and culture: among the events she organized were the Brunelleschi Centenary in 1977, the Medici exhibitions in 1980, and the congress on Etruscan art and history in 1983. From 1984 to 2016 she was head of the Casa Buonarroti Foundation in Florence, for which she achieved important milestones, chief among them the rearrangement of the collections by returning objects to placements based on the study of ancient inventories and the history of the Buonarroti family itself. Thanks in part to Pina Ragionieri’s work, Casa Buonarroti has acquired great international notoriety, and for her work she was awarded the gold medal of the President of the Republic and a first-class diploma as a well-deserving person for culture and art on April 8, 1997. To her credit she also has several publications on Michelangelo, and has curated many exhibitions on the great Florentine artist.

There was unanimous condolence from political and cultural figures. The Casa Buonarroti Foundation stated that “in her, as those who knew her well know, the qualities of humanity and sympathy were united with those of a fine intellectual, a lover of music and literature, and a scholar of the life and work of the ’divine’ Michelangelo.” This is how Eike D. Schmidt, director of the Uffizi: "Pina Ragionieri’s passing leaves a great void in the world of Italian and international culture. The Uffizi Galleries express their deep condolences, paying her a sincere tribute and an emotional farewell. A great intellectual, she believed in young people and courageously supported pioneering projects. Under her direction, the first ever monographic exhibition dedicated to the seventeenth-century painter Artemisia Gentileschi was held at Casa Buonarroti as well as an important retrospective on Cecco Bravo, and many other initiatives of the highest caliber. I also remember how fundamental was his contribution to the expansion of studies on Michelangelo Buonarroti."

Thus, on the other hand, the mayor of Florence, Dario Nardella: “With Pina Ragionieri leaves us one of the most attentive, passionate, prepared and significant figures in the cultural panorama of Florence. I knew and appreciated her personally, a woman always tireless and valuable, director first and president later of Casa Buonarroti, a house-museum that she wanted not only as a place of memory but also of research and study of Michelangelo’s genius. Florence will miss her free and authentic voice, her pure love for culture and her lucid will to carry on her work until the very end. My personal and the administration’s condolences go out to the family.”

Following instead is the remembrance of Enrico Rossi, governor of the region of Tuscany: “I learned with great sorrow of the death of Pina Ragionieri, a woman of extraordinary culture, president of Casa Buonarroti in Florence, unanimously recognized as one of the greatest scholars of Michelangelo. Of her, in particular, I have always appreciated her ability to interweave intellectual commitment and political passion for the dissemination of culture. I extend my sincere condolences to her family and to all the people who worked together with her over the years.”

In the photo, Pina Ragionieri (frame taken from the documentary Salviamo la memoria)

Farewell to Pina Ragionieri, Michelangelo scholar and longtime president of Casa Buonarroti

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