A Wind God. Artist: Pietro da Cortona (Pietro Berrettini) (Italian, Cortona 1596-1669 Rome). Dimensions: 7 7/16 x 13 1/8in. (18.9 x 33.3cm). Date: 1669.This study of a youth after life served for the figure of a wind god, appearing at the edge of the central oval of the frescoed ceiling in the "Sala di Apollo" (Palazzo Pitti, Florence). In 1641, the Baroque master Pietro da Cortona undertook the decoration of the state rooms of the Palazzo Pitti, using an iconographic program that dedicated each room to a planet symbolic of the virtues required of a prince, from youth through old age. The "Sala di Venere" was the first to be finished, then the "Sala di Giove" and the "Sala di Marte." It is not clear how far work on the elaborate stucco ornament for the "Sala di Apollo" had progressed when Cortona left for Rome in 1647. The frescoes had hardly been begun. Cortona himself was never able to return to Florence to complete the project, and the decoration was finished by his principal assist