MUSEO NAZIONALE DEL BARGELLO
- carlottaceccarini9
- Sep 2, 2022
- 4 min read
The museum, which along with the Medici Chapels, Orsanmichele, Palazzo Davanzati and Casa Martelli is part of the Bargello Museum complex. It is dedicated to Renaissance sculpture and has one of the most remarkable collections, including sculptures by Michelangelo, Donatello, Ghiberti, Cellini, Giambologna and other important names in art history.
After the victory of the Guelphs over the Ghibellines in the mid-1200s, it was decided to reorganise the government and build a new seat. According to Giorgio Vasari, the architect of the building, and subsequent extensions, was Lapo Tedesco. In 1260, the palazzo became the very seat of the Podestà, from whom it takes its name (Palazzo del Podestà) and from where he administered criminal and civil justice. In fact, it was equipped with cells and was for many centuries one of the places set aside for executions, interrogations and torture (Dante Alighieri's sentence of exile took place here). In the years that followed, the palace was subjected to several restorations and modifications due to the numerous fights in Florentine territory and assaults on the palace itself that damaged it several times. Around 1300 it was the renowned painter Giotto and his workshop who enriched the building with the frescoes in the Magdalene Chapel (in which there is a portrait of Dante himself).
With the rise of the Medici family, the Palazzo became the seat of the Council of Justice until 1547, when Duke Cosimo I de'Medici moved the magistracy to the Palazzo Castellani and the Palazzo del Podestà became the seat of the bargello, i.e. the head of the guards. From this moment on, the Florentine palace became a real prison and thus suffered severe degradation.
In the 19th century, at the same time as a renewed interest in the city and Florentine art, Vasari documented the presence of a portrait of Dante by the master Giotto inside the Bargello. Around mid-1800, Baron Seymour Kirkup (a British painter and art historian) and his collaborators began a series of surveys. Thanks to them, the portrait of Dante within an articulated representation of the Last Judgement and the stories of Mary of Egypt and Mary Magdalene were brought to light. Images of the masterpieces contained within the palace were disseminated in Italian and foreign magazines, guidebooks and manuals, contributing to a renewed interest and notoriety for the palace itself.
In 1847, yet another revolt broke out against the guards and it became evident that the prisoners needed to be moved to more suitable premises. Ten years later, the Palace was emptied and restoration work began under the direction of Francesco Mazzei. The Palazzo was destined to become the seat of a Museum of Ancient Monuments, through which the history of Tuscany, its institutions, customs and arts would be illustrated. In the midst of the Neo-Gothic climate, the line of thought of restoration was the recovery of the 'old', often with architectural ornaments and pictorial decorations ex novo. In 1861, during the first Italian National Exhibition, the Palazzo was opened to the public for the first time.
Initially conceived as a museum of Industrial Arts, then as a museum of the Middle Ages and again as a National Historical and Archaeological Museum, the Bargello Museum was finally designated as a National Museum, the first in Italy, at the same time as Florence was named capital city. The Bargello thus became the display container for the most recent statues from the Galleries, the collection of the Medici Armoury, the statues from the Salone del Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio, the small bronzes from the Medici Guardaroba and other objects that had hitherto been kept in private deposits. Since then, its collection has expanded to include applied arts, majolica, waxes, enamels, ivories, ambers, tapestries, gold, medals, coins, seals, plaques and textiles. Over the years, the Museum also came into possession of extraordinary examples of 'minor' European and non-European arts.
The Bargello Museum was hard hit by the 1966 flood and by a theft in 2006 in broad daylight, during opening hours, involving three pieces of ancient Islamic jewellery.
Entering the museum, one enters the central courtyard where the reconstruction of the Fountain of Juno by Bartolomeo Ammanati (father of the Fountain of Neptune in Piazza della Signoria) stands out. In the centre is Ceres flanked by personifications of the rivers Arno and Parnassus, an allusion to the territories of Siena conquered by Cosimo I, which in turn are surrounded by Prudence and Flora, an allegory of Florence; at the top centre is Juno seated between two peacocks, animals sacred to her, a tribute to Eleonora di Toledo, wife of Cosimo I. In dialogue with the fountain is Giambologna's monumental statue of Ocean, lord of the waters, and Vincenzo Danti's statue in honour of Cosimo I de'Medici, together with several works depicting saints and cardinals.
Past the courtyard are the Medieval Sculpture room, in which Arnolfo di Cambio's sculptural group stands out, the Ivories’s room, the Chapel of the Mayor, the Carrand Collection, the Bruzzichelli Room, the Majolica Room, the Verrocchio Room and the Room of the Second Fifteenth Century, the Bronze Room, the della Robbia Room, the Armoury Room and finally the Baroque Sculpture and Medal Room.
The two most fascinating spaces in the Bargello Museum remain the rooms dedicated to Michelangelo and Donatello. In the former one can see the statue of drunken Bacchus still staggering on one foot by a young Michelangelo Buonarroti, the bas-relief Tondo Pitti (1504) depicting the Madonna and Child Jesus and St. John, and the more mature David-Apollo and Portrait of Brutus. In the second room one can admire some of Donatello's best works, such as St. George from the cycle of the 14 statues of the protectors of the Arts of Florence and the two Davids, in marble and bronze.
Before the end of the exhibition itinerary, the bust of Cosimo I by Benvenuto Cellini is astonishing, a sort of Mona Lisa with a gaze that shoots into the eyes of the spectator, staring at him and capturing his attention. The Grand Duke presented in the manner of imperial portraits and with his head slightly turned to give him a noble and haughty bearing. A refined technique and particular attention to detail make this bust one of the emblems of the Bargello Museum.
Photos made by Carlotta Ceccarini
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