Modelli interpretativi a servizio dell’arte: la porta del Paradiso di Lorenzo Ghiberti / Interpretative models employed by Art: the Gates of Paradise by Lorenzo Ghiberti

The Gates of Paradise in the Florence Baptistery [1], created by Lorenzo Ghiberti between 1427 and 1452, is recognised as one of the works that marked the transition from the Medieval Art to Re- naissance Art by art critics [Krautheimer 1970, pp. 298-305].The bas-reliefs of the ten bronze panels showcase, from both an iconographic and a technical point of view, a marked difference from the previous production, even by the same master.The element that endures through this change is the narrative function of art; in the Christian art, the figurative language continues to play an important catechetical role [Ciardi Duprè Dal Poggetto 1978, pp. 330-332]. In order to fully understand the meaning of the transfigured text, it is necessary, both today and in the past, to possess the reading codes. Over the centuries these codes have gradually been lost, thus making the scenes depicted in the door partially ‘mute’. The contribution intends to illustrate an experience carried out by a group of researchers from DIDA (University of Florence) CHMLab, in collaboration with the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore Museum in the field of digital humanities, aimed at analysing and restoring, through 3D modelling and animation, the events that took place within the ‘landscape of the panels’, creating a renewed and more immediate reading.