Uffizi opens new rooms and displays frescoes uncovered during covid-19 shutdown.

When the Uffizi Gallery reopens in Florence on 4 May, after months of closure due to Italy's covid-19 restrictions, visitors will be greeted by recently discovered frescoes and newly renovated rooms.

The expanded visitor experience will comprise almost 2,000 sqm of new spaces, previously inaccessible to the public, including 14 new rooms on the ground floor of the east wing, eight rooms in the west wing and 21 rooms in the basement.

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The 14 new rooms in the east wing will display 129 works, many of them never seen before, including paintings by masters ranging from Andrea del Sarto and Parmigianino to Bernini, Chagall and Guttuso, reports Italian news agency ANSA.

The openings are part of the "New Uffizi" project which has restored and reclaimed more than 40 rooms in total. 

The frescoes, dating from the 17th and 18th centuries, were uncovered over the winter during restoration work on the ground floor of the museum's west wing, which houses the new visitor entrance, facing the river Arno.

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The long lost frescoes include a life-size figure of a young Cosimo II de Medici, a member of the powerful Renaissance family that commissioned the Uffizi, dating from the 1600s.

As part of the Uffizi's new entry system, visitors will buy tickets in the west wing and cross through a courtyard to the east wing, where they will pass through metal detectors, before beginning their visit.

From 4 May the Uffizi is open Tuesday to Sunday from 08.15 until 18.50, for full visiting details see website.

Photo La Repubblica.