14th Century

We cannot talk of this century without making immediate reference to Giovanni Pisano's masterpiece of which, sadly, only fragments remain: sublime, however. The figure of Margaret of Brabant rising from the tomb (currently under restoration) dates to around 1313 and remains a fundamental moment in Western sculpture and one of the pivotal works of the museum. The artistic environment of the time was extremely varied, from Lombard artisans, of the workshop of the "Maestro di Giano" (who were working on the refurbishment of the cathedral after the devastating fire at the end of 1297, and from there went on to work throughout the city) to Tuscan masters such as Giovanni di Balduccio and the "Master of the Fieschi tomb", and reaching a local synthesis in the sepulchral statue of Simone Boccanegra (1363), in which the simplified forms of the body and clothes enhance the raw realism of the face of the recumbent figure.