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Now I must take you back to the bronze gates of the Baptistery in their triumphant completion nearly a hundred years after the first gate was executed by Andrea Pisano.
From the pulpit of Niccola Pisano down to Mantegna's 'Triumph of Caesar, and the service Cellini designed for King Francis, the influence of this spirit can be traced; nor was it confined merely to the immobile arts the arts of arrested movement but its influence was to be seen also in the great Graeco-Roman masques which were the constant amusement of the gay courts of the time, and in the public pomps and processions with which the citizens of big commercial towns were wont to greet the princes that chanced to visit them; pageants, by the way, which were considered so important that large prints were made of them and published a fact which is a proof of the general interest at the time in matters of such kind.
Giovanni Pisano, to whom we owe the Spina Chapel and the Campo Santo at Pisa, the façade of the Sienese Duomo, and the altar-shrine of S. Donato at Arezzo four of the purest works of Gothic art in Italy showed a very decided leaning to the vehement and mystic style of the Transalpine sculptors.
It was with melancholy feelings that we stepped into the hall or vestibule, whose broken plasters are still graced with coats-armorial and emblems of ancient dignity; amongst the rest, two standards wrapped up round their staves, probably memorials of the great Pisano a naval commander of the fourteenth century.
Nay, you can scarcely match it then for grace of line, only in the richest flamboyant of France. Now this fact would set you, if you looked at art from its aesthetic side only, at once to find out what German artists had taught Giovanni Pisano.
Antonio was a frail little fellow, and his grandfather liked to have him near him during his working hours. While Pisano worked at stone-cutting, little Canova played at it and at other things, such as modelling in clay, drawing, etc.
Domenico Morone, who was born at Verona about the year 1430, learned the art of painting from some masters who were disciples of Stefano, and from works by the same Stefano, by Jacopo Bellini, by Pisano, and by others, which he saw and copied. Saying nothing of the many pictures that he executed after the manner of those times, which are now in monasteries and private houses, I begin by recording that he painted in chiaroscuro, with "terretta verde," the façade of a house belonging to the city of Verona, on the square called the Piazza de' Signori; and in this may be seen many ornamental friezes and scenes from ancient history, with a very beautiful arrangement of figures and costumes of bygone days. But the best work to be seen by the hand of this master is the Leading of Christ to the Cross, with a multitude of figures and horses, which is in S. Bernardino, on the wall above the Chapel of the Monte di Piet
The speaker was a delicate, pale-faced boy, about twelve years old, who had been engaged to help in some of the minor details of preparation for the great event. "You!" exclaimed the steward, gazing in amazement at the modest, yet apparently audacious lad before him. "And who are you?" "I am Antonio Canova, the grandson of Pisano, the stonecutter."
Meanwhile at seven o'clock the four oxen, which are kept in the Cascine all the year round and do no other work, had been harnessed to the car and had drawn it to the Piazza del Duomo, which was reached about nine. The oxen were then tethered by the Pisano doors of the Baptistery until needed again.
It has all the richness of Greek Daedal work, nay, it has fire and life beyond much Greek Daedal work; but in so far as it is non-natural, symbolic, decorative, and not like an actual lion, it would be felt by Niccola Pisano to be imperfect.
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