Raphaels and Rubens vie for centre stage in the enviable collection of 16th- to 18th-century art amassed by the Medici and Lorraine dukes in Palazzo Pitti's Galleria Palatina. The gallery, reached via a staircase from the central courtyard, has retained the original display arrangement of paintings (squeezed in, often on top of each other), so can be visually overwhelming – go slow and focus on the works one by one.
Highlights include Fra' Filippo Lippi's Madonna and Child with Stories from the Life of St Anne (aka the Tondo Bartolini; 1452–53) and Botticelli's Madonna with Child and a Young Saint John the Baptist (c 1490–95) in the Sala di Prometeo ; Raphael's Madonna of the Window (1513–14) in the Sala di Ulisse ; and Caravaggio's Sleeping Cupid (1608) in the Sala dell'Educazione di Giove . Don't miss the Sala di Saturno , full of magnificent works by Raphael, including the Madonna of the Chair (1511) and portraits of Anolo Doni and Maddalena Strozzi (c 1506). Nearby, in the Sala di Giove , the same artist's Lady with a Veil (aka La Velata; c 1516) holds court alongside Giorgione's Three Ages of Man (c 1500).
