Uffizi, Eike Schmidt hands over keys to museum to new director Simone Verde

The handover between the new director and the outgoing director at the Uffizi Galleries was held this morning: the newly appointed director Simone Verde today symbolically received in the museum’s auditorium, just today named after Antonio Paolucci (who passed away on Feb. 4), the key to the museum’s ancient door from his predecessor, Eike Schmidt, who passed on to direct the Capodimonte Museum and Real Bosco. The event was held in the same auditorium, shortly after the directors had uncovered, in the Gallery’s loggia, the plaque naming the great art historian.

“I came to Florence especially for this ceremony.” said Eike Schmidt, “immediately afterwards I will return to the museum I direct in Naples, Capodimonte; at the Uffizi there is still a lot to be done and with a bit of luck at the end of the first four years of Simone Verde’s directorship the 60 million in revenue we had realized by the end of 2023 could be doubled.”

“Eike,” replied Uffizi director Verde, “actualized the Uffizi’s vocation to be the most important Italian museum: there was a lot of unexpressed potential that Schmidt was able to bring to light. Now, with my direction, the goal is to make the Uffizi the central hub of the whole national system of museums: because the Uffizi, of this system, is the natural point of reference.” Among the various projects announced by Verde for the near future of the Galleries are “a study center named after Antonio Paolucci, founded on the basis of his book collection donated to the Uffizi, the creation of a section at the Gallery of Statues and Paintings of the history of the collections, the absolute relaunching of the Treasure of the Grand Dukes and the Pitti Palace, the launch, also in the Pitti Palace, of the open deposits project to offer to the public for the first time the Reggia’s very prestigious heritage of historical furniture, the opening of three projects to enhance the Boboli Gardens, and the dematerialization of tickets.”

The new director of the Uffizi also announced that the museum is working “to activate a weekly evening opening intended for Florentines,” and on the upcoming opening of the Vasari Corridor he assured, “I am monitoring the construction site with inspections every week: the works must be on time.”

Uffizi, Eike Schmidt hands over keys to museum to new director Simone Verde

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