Voiceover: Here we have a view of Florence
where we can see the bell tower,
the Campanile in the center, and then on the left
just a little corner of the Baptistry,
and on the back end the Cathedral of Florence
with Brunelleschi's dome at the top.
Voiceover: Right.
The Baptistry is a medieval building
from the 10th century probably.
The Cathedral, the Duomo, they began
building almost around 1300
and the bell tower starts going up
a little bit after that and then the dome is built
from the early 1400s and finished in the 1470s.
Voiceover: So what are we looking at with the bell tower?
Voiceover: The bell tower, right now,
we're gonna concentrate on the very bottom.
Around 1340, even though the tower
wasn't complete yet, they decided,
the town and the guilds of Florence,
specifically the wool guild that was in charge
of decorating the cathedral,
decided that they wanted to decorate
the bottom of the tower because even though
it wasn't complete, it was embarrassing
having just this bare undecorated surface
where everyone's walking around,
as you can see, all the time.
And so the two very bottom layers
are decorated with many reliefs
and these are in stone marble
rather than the bronze that's on the Baptistry.
The reliefs cover a lot of subjects.
There are Biblical scenes.
There are signs of the Zodiac.
There are also scenes of local art and industry.
Some of these things may sound unusual.
Of course, the Biblical scenes makes
sense on the church building.
Voiceover: Industry and the - ?
Voiceover: Those are a little bit unusual.
We'll see why they might want to include those.
We should also say that the Zodiac signs
are not unusual because the medieval Christians
were very able or very comfortably blended
their belief in Christianity
and their Christian devotion
with interest in the horoscope.
Voiceover: Yep, and we see that
a lot on medieval churches.
Voiceover: That's right.
Let's look at some of these reliefs.
Here's one of the religious scenes.
This is the Creation of Adam.
The artist is Andrea Pisano,
who around the same time is working on
the bronze reliefs just across the street
on the south doors of the Baptistry.
Those scenes were about John the Baptist
and here's one of the Biblical scenes on the bell tower.
And again, this is typical of his style
as we've described it.
It's very, very simplified with mostly
a blank background, just a few things to give
you a sense of the setting, here a few stylized trees,
and we have God leaning over and creating Adam.
Voiceover: Yeah, literally out of the dust of the earth
and he sort of takes form.
Voiceover: Right and this is another good example
of how Andrea Pisano combines a kind of gothic
stylization with a naturalistic classicism.
Voiceover: Where do you see the gothic stylization?
Voiceover: Well, the figure of God the Father,
in some ways the way the robes are rendered
without a great sense of the body underneath,
the kind of rhythmic folds,
all of this is pretty traditional.
Voiceover: Right so we have sense of the body,
but there's not an entire sense of a real physical
anatomically correct body underneath it.
Voiceover: That's right.
Voiceover: Like there will be later with Donatello.
Voiceover: Mm hmm and instead, the figure of Adam
is a nude athletic male
even though it's damaged here,
it's classicizing and it's naturalistic.
He's in a contrapposto stance
evnen though he's lying down.
That doesn't make any sense.
Contrapposto is usually something
for standing up, but the fact that he's
done that anyway shows how interested
he was in giving it a classic appearance.
Voiceover: Yeah, I mean, we can see his ribs
and some muscles there too.
Voiceover: That's right.
So this is very typical for his style.
Here now we're looking at one
of the scenes of local industry.
Voiceover: Wow, this looks a lot like
the one of God creating Adam.
Voiceover: Well, it's interesting that you say that
because the industry that's represented
here is sculpture and this is an interesting way
for an artist, Andrea Pisano, to suggest that
the work of the sculptor, the work of the artist,
is in some ways like the work of God.
Both are creators.
In fact, we also see again the creator here,
the artist, leaning over a bearded man,
in rather stylized robes, leaning over
a nude, more naturalistic,
more classicizing figure.
Now, of course, he's not going to get in trouble.
There's a sense of modesty here because
look again and compare this to
the way God creates Adam.
God is in nature, He uses a gesture of his hand,
and Adam is clearly supposed to be
a real living person.
When we look at the sculptor in the studio,
he's in the studio, he's using tools.
The use of the tools is really conspicuous.
Voiceover: He can't create simply by his word
or by some kind of spiritual action.
Voiceover: That's right.
And also what he's creating is not
going to be mistaken for a real person.
It's stiff and it's much smaller in scale.
Voiceover: But still it seems to be almost a sign
of the desire to elevate the status of the artist.
Voiceover: It absolutely is a sign of that
and it's also definitely a sign of the pride
that the Florentines take in their arts.
I mean, this is a very important location,
the bell tower of the Cathedral,
and they're displaying in a way what makes them
proud and prosperous as Florentines.
In one part, it's the arts.
Voiceover: And so this could be described as
part of that civic pride that I always think
is so important in terms of commissioning
so much art in the Renaissance.
Voiceover: That's right.
Here's another scene of local industry.
This is weaving, which is one of the main reasons
why Florence is so very prosperous around 1340
when these reliefs are being made.
You could talk about it in terms of the style
being typical for Andrea Pisano,
the boiling down to the essential ingredients,
but really what stands out is the way it celebrates industry,
manual labor and the things that make
this city where it is.
Voiceover: It's amazing.
And so the guilds were really powerful
in enriching the city and decorating the city
with beautiful sculptures and reliefs
and at the same time wanting to see
their own image in a way.
Voiceover: That's right.