An addition to Florence's famed Uffizi museum by one of the world's top architects has received a final green light after years of polemics and work is expected to begin soon.
The new exit canopy or loggia designed by Japanese architect Arata Isozaki has been okayed by Florence's Architectural Heritage Superintendent Paola Grifoni, the local press reported on Wednesday.
Isozaki's loggia is a part of an ambitious 60 million euro refurbishment and development project, dubbed the Grandi Uffizi, which will more than double the exhibition space at the gallery.
Work on the internal renovation began in January and is expected to be completed by 2013.
The architect's design for the exit in Piazza dei Castellani - around the corner from the Uffizi's main entrance - involves a high, loggia structure in steel, polycarbonate and stone.
Isozaki's seven-million-euro-project was initially scheduled for completion by the end of 2003.
Culture Minister Francesco Rutelli had already approved the project in January, seven years after the architect won an international bid for the exit design.
The recent discovery of a large collection of Medieval artefacts gave officials a plausible reason for blocking the construction work.
But the main reason the loggia had been held up was the fierce opposition of some influential intellectuals, including Vittorio Sgarbi, a gadfly art critic and former culture undersecretary who called Isozaki's design "anal" and "a sardine can".
Sgarbi railed against the project again on Wednesday, saying that the decision to go ahead with it was "incomprehensible".
Florentine-born film and stage director Franco Zeffirelli also took a strong stance against the project.
Because of Sgarbi's strictures, the signature project was changed to appease critics.
Isozaki, whose works include Barcelona's Olympic Stadium and a hockey stadium for the Turin Winter Olympics, is famed for his bold, colourful geometric forms and careful detailing. He once studied in Florence.
His major works outside Japan include the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art (1981-86), the Disney Building at Orlando, Florida (1987-91), the Barcelona sports palace in Spain (1988-92) and the Museum at La Coruna, also in Spain (1993-95).
In landing the job, Isozaki beat a very strong field including Norman Foster from Britain, Italy's Gae Aulenti and Vittorio Gregotti, Mario Botta from Switzerland and Hans Hollein of Vienna.
Grifoni said that Isozaki would now have to present a working project which takes into account problems created by the ongoing archaeological digs in the area where his loggia will be built.
Since a company has already been chosen to build the loggia, work can proceed as soon as Isozaki presents his plan, she said.
Grifoni believes the project can be completed by 2011.
NEW UFFIZI WILL SURPASS LOUVRE, OFFICIALS SAY.
Art officials have boasted that once renovation is completed the Uffizi, which currently lures more than 1.5 million visitors a year, will "surpass the Louvre."
One of the project's aims is to drastically cut the time visitors are forced to spend queuing.
The Uffizi, which houses one of the greatest art collections in the world, currently offers 6,000 square metres of display space.
Once the enlargement plan is completed, that will be upped to 13,000 square meters, allowing the gallery to bring out hundreds of works that are now kept in storage because of the lack of space.
There will be room to show more than 2,000 art works compared to 1,200 at present.
The Uffizi will also be able to double the number of visitors admitted daily, from 4,000 to 8,000.
The Uffizi, an unusual U-shaped building, was begun in 1560 by the artist and art critic Giorgio Vasari and completed according to his design by the architects Alfonso Parigi the Elder and Bernardo Buontalenti.
The gallery was commissioned by duke of Florence and grand duke of Tuscany Cosimo I to serve as government offices, or 'uffici' in Italian, and hence Uffizi.
Resting on unstable sandy ground, it is a feat of engineering skill.
The origins of the Uffizi collection date back to Cosimo I. Members of the Medici dynasty continued to add to the collection over the years, with the last of the Medici, Anna Maria Lodovica, settling her inheritance on the people of Florence in 1737.
The gallery boasts a host of Renaissance masterpieces including Botticelli's famous Primavera (Spring) and The Birth of Venus.
