Original subtitles

Good afternoon. We've discussed thus far several sculptors in this course, Ghiberti,

Donatello, Luca della Robbia too briefly, and Pagliauolo in the last lecture. Sculpture

throughout the Quattrocento took many forms, ranging from architectural embellishment to

portraiture from large public monuments to small bronze statuettes for the private collector. The

Pagliauolo, Hercules, and Antaeus that we saw in the last lecture was a good introduction to the

small Renaissance bronzes that have always remained the connoisseur's special delight. This lecture

will examine both small and large sculpture and the contrasting contributions to Renaissance art of

four masters of the medium, Antonio Pisanello, Francesco di Giorgio, Antonio Rossellino, and Andrea del Verrocchio.

Antonio Pisanello, who was born about 1395 and lived until 1455 or 56, was probably born in Pisa. He trained in

Verona. He worked in Venice, Mantua, Milan, Rome, Naples, and elsewhere. He was much in demand. He was a

skillful and significant painter, but his painting remained strongly connected to a late medieval courtly

tradition. His contribution to sculpture, on the other hand, lay in the reinvention of the ancient Roman coin in the

form of the medal. Medals are a specialized field within small sculpture that may seem more like

numismatics to the 21st century viewer, but medals were dear to the hearts of Renaissance artists and collectors.

Medals echoed ancient Roman coins, which featured portraits and attributes of Roman emperors, and the

Renaissance medal was a conscious attempt to emulate the Roman achievement. Unlike the coin, of course, the

medal had no monetary value, no currency. But like the Roman coin, it had a portrait on one side and a related

design on the reverse. Roman coins typically bore the portraits of emperors. In Pisanello's work, they bore images of a

wider range of Renaissance persons, attesting to the new sense of individuality. You see here an image which shows both

sides of a medal at the same time. It is by Pisanello, and it is one of his most famous medals, struck in 1447. It features a

profile portrait of Cecilia Gonzaga, daughter of Gianfrancesco I Gonzaga, the Marcus of Mantua. The medal was

struck, as I say, in 1447 after Cecilia, or if you prefer Cecilia, had entered a convent following the death of her

father. It is Pisanello's only female portrait. The reverse is an exquisite poetic image that refers to the

chastity of the sitter in symbols probably unfamiliar to modern eyes. A partially nude maiden, on the left, sits in a

moonlit, rocky landscape. The moon above, the rocks here. The mountainous landscape is a symbol of the

difficult path of virtue. The moon is a symbol of Diana, the mythological virgin goddess of the hunt, and the

unicorn, whose horn lies across her lap, was a symbolic reference to virginity, because it was believed that

only a virgin could tame a unicorn. By extension, this reference to virginity became a reference to the

Virgin Mary. That was common enough. Of course, this would seem to beg the question of how one finds a

unicorn in the first place, but that was solved simply by having the maiden sit in a glade, a wooded area,

and the unicorn came to the maiden. You see also on the right-hand side a rectangular stile, or pillar,

and that bears the date of this medal. Francesco di Giorgio was born in 1439 and died in 151, or perhaps 152.

He was Sienese. Indeed, he is considered the finest Sienese artist of the late Quattrocento, and like

Pisanello, he was multi-talented. He was a painter, a sculptor, and an architect. In the National Gallery in

Washington, you will find this Saint Jerome, modeled and cast somewhere in the 1470s or early 1480s.

Francesco di Giorgio modeled his saints and other figures in wax or clay with a spontaneous rough

surface that creates a visual and emotional charge. When cast in bronze, the rough surface

causes light to flicker over it. The effect is one of nervous agitation, which animates his subjects,

and in the case of his religious figures, lends a spiritual intensity to them. This Saint Jerome

is on a large plaque about 22 inches high, and it is a fine example of this emotional expressiveness.

The penitent saint is kneeling in a rocky landscape, a rocky wilderness really, in adoration of a crucifix

which hangs from the leafless tree in front of him. He appears to be speaking or praying aloud.

There are affinities here, stylistic affinities and emotional ones, with the late work of Donatello

and also with that of Verrocchio, his contemporary.

The importance of each city-state in Italy during the Renaissance, whether under a republican or despotic rule,

led to great emphasis on public monuments. Nowhere was this more true than in Florence,

where many monumental sculptures were erected in and near civic and religious buildings.

Elaborate tombs were of great importance. Paid for by the families of the deceased,

they were seen by all classes of society. One such tomb, in San Miniato in Florence,

was designed by Antonio Rosolino for the very young Cardinal of Portugal.

It is not just the tomb, but the entire chapel that was a monument to the deceased Cardinal of Portugal.

And the church, San Miniato Almonte, was a church in an extraordinarily beautiful location above the city.

The chapel was designed and constructed in the early 1460s, completed in 1466.

Antonio Rosolino was born in 1427 and died in 1479. He was one of five brothers who were artists,

born in Cettignano, just five miles from Florence, where he mostly worked. And though he also made portraits,

he was mostly concerned with larger sculptural forms, some of them architectural in size and function.

Tomb sculpture was among the most ambitious types of monumental sculpture, not simply the decoration

of a tomb, but the design and construction of the entire tomb. Sometimes sculptors and architects collaborated,

sometimes the sculptor was solely responsible for the work. The tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal

is an especially elaborate example of a tomb complex, especially since it involves the entire chapel.

I'm not going to describe the painting and the other aspects of this, but as you can see,

the entire chapel is an elaborate and beautifully decorated affair. It was made for a prelate who died

at 25 and whose wealthy and distinguished family commissioned the work, in accordance with his will,

for San Miniato Almonte in Florence. As I say, a church, a Romanesque church, by the way,

which is on a picturesque hillside on the south side of the Arno, overlooking Florence.

The tomb niche was just one part of a large burial chapel. The chapel was probably designed by an architect

named Antonio Manetti, who died a short time later and was unable to continue working on the project.

Before I close, move closer to the tomb, I'd like to see it from this angle. You can see that it's set

in a deeply arched niche with large rosettes decorating the band around that, marking the depth of the niche,

these large rosettes within the rectangles. Marble curtains have been drawn back

to reveal the tomb. Now I'll show you the closer image. Marble curtains have been drawn back to reveal

the tomb, you can see them here left and right, as if it were on a stage. Rosolino must have been largely

responsible for the architecture of the tomb niche, even if its general outline had been fixed by the

architect of the entire chapel. The tomb and the architectural scheme of the niche are clearly

conceived as a unit. There is a base, very lowest part, which is decorated with a skull in the center

and with swags, a swag, pardon me, and angels, supporting a sarcophagus upon which to putti,

well, let's go back to that word we've heard it, I think, before, p-u-t-t-i, the two putti sit.

They, in turn, support a bier with the effigy of the cardinal. Two larger angels, right and left,

kneel on a mantle-like shelf behind and above the effigy, and above them two flying angels hold a wreath

surrounding a relief of the Madonna and child. It was already recognized by his contemporaries that

Rosolino based the sarcophagus, the lower part, the tomb part, on a Roman sarcophagus that was then

in the Pantheon in Rome, and that was recognized and recorded. From early descriptions, we know that

many parts of the sculpture were originally painted. For instance, the robes of the cardinal

were gilded, and the virgin and child above, against the blue background, which we see here,

and the curtains and the back wall, the back wall here and the curtains, were red. The discovery

that Renaissance marble sculpture was sometimes painted always comes as a surprise to the modern

viewer, as does the knowledge that ancient Greek sculpture was also polychromed. We've come to

expect our funerary monuments to be a solemn gray rather than festively colored, but for the cardinal

of Portugal, whose pious sobriety of character was legendary, he was a man who did not enter a room

when there were women there and left if one came in, his sobriety of character, as I say, was legendary,

and the passage for this sober cardinal from an earthly life to eternal life and the promise of salvation

were to be celebrated. And thus, in his will, he left a detailed description of the type of monument

by which he wished to be commemorated. Let me show you the close-up in a moment of the effigy with the

Apoutian angels. Before I do, I'm always loath to leave this entire image, before I do, notice the floor

level in respect to the effigy. If you're standing on the floor, your head would come, I assume,

approximately to the height of the cornice on the sarcophagus, probably not much higher than that.

So you were looking up at the effigy. And that was understood and therefore taken into account

by the artist. And he therefore turns the figure, the head of the deceased, enough so that you can see

the profile from that standing viewpoint. The reason I emphasize that is that this next image,

the detail of the effigy has been taken, the photograph has been taken from a higher viewpoint

than intended by the artist. Photographers, especially for books and so forth, have a tendency

to erect a lot of scaffolding and take pictures of a piece of sculpture that you couldn't possibly

have seen from that point of view. And while there are advantages to that, seeing a little more detail

and so forth, it also disguises the fact that, in this case, that Rossellino has so turned that head,

that if we were below looking up, it was easily visible to the viewer standing below. We don't have

to have our eye level raised as much as it has been here. Putti. In case I didn't describe or define the

word when used before, a putto, p-u-t-t-o, is a sort of supporting character in Renaissance art.

They're infants. They are not winged as a rule. They're not specifically Christian. They're found

very widely in classical Roman art. They do have an angelic appearance, as it were, and are often used

in Christian art. But they are just generic infants, and they may or may not express emotions which are

appropriate to the event, in this case, in a tomb. These two putti who support are somber, but not

particularly overtly emotional in that way. So they sit and support, in part, the effigy, which has a

beautiful, delicate, or perhaps elegant is a better word, sweep of drapery here, this wonderful curve

against the rectilinearity of the tomb below it. The prelate with his folded hands, which are also

extraordinarily delicately realized. A tremendous amount of careful and highly able effort went into

the carving of the hands and the face of this figure. The angels, who almost balance on these

shelves, as it were, above, and bow toward the figure and also, of course, toward the Madonna,

which is above. And this is the relief of the Madonna and child with those two angels and the two

angels who support it as well. Antonio Rosalino had many assistants in the realization of such a large work.

But in the main, and especially in that sensitive effigy of the cardinal, it's his work

and his masterpiece as well. Andrea del Verrocchio was the most important among this group of sculptors.

He was born about 1435. He died in 1488. Quite aside from the fact that he was the master of Leonardo da Vinci,

Barocchio was a wonderfully gifted sculptor and an occasional painter whose work has received

especially renewed admiration in recent years. Reputations come and go. His has had waned for a time,

but has increased greatly. He produced sculpture of various types and materials and sizes. His David,

which is bronze and which was made between about 1465 and 70, was surely inspired by Donatello's David.

But it's smaller in size than Donatello's and different in character. The left arm and the leg

placement come from Donatello's David, but the angularity introduced in the left elbow and the left

knee, the sharpness of the left knee, change the look and feel of the statue completely. The sensuosity of

Donatello is replaced by, well, teenage gangliness. And although it is always a stretch to imagine the

young David slaying the giant Goliath, this one at least has the wiry build to attempt it. Of course,

like Donatello's David, Verrocchio's has already accomplished the deed and the head of Goliath lies at his

feet, partly between his feet. His David was recently restored and is on exhibition as a result of that

restoration. It was probably commissioned initially by Piero di Cosimo di Medici. There are a lot of

Medici's, but Piero di Cosimo di Medici is assumed to have commissioned this, and in 1476 it was sold

by his son Lorenzo, the famous Lorenzo, to the city, to the city of Florence, and installed inside the

Palazzo della Signoria. At this time, it was altered by the artist so that it could fit onto a small

column in a niche. So the artist returns to his work and makes a change, which is a little surprising,

given the fact that it is bronze, which of course tells us that that head was cast separately and

attached separately, and it could be moved. The change involved moving the head of Goliath from a

position to David's right to the one we see now between his feet. Originally, the head was off to

his right. It was moved between his feet to allow it to fit on the column. And as I say, in this restored

state it's been, it has been moved for temporary exhibition, but the intention is to replace it,

replace the head between the feet, because that is after all where Verrocchio finally placed it in

his reworking. It is sort of Verrocchio's second state of his own, uh, own sculpture. One of Verrocchio's

most prominent and outstanding achievements was the group of Christ and Saint Thomas for the Guild Hall,

Orsan Michele, which we've spoken of before. Christ and Saint Thomas was produced over a long period,

between 1465 and 1483. It was for a niche on the façade of Orsan Michele. Verrocchio designed this to

fit into a niche which had originally held a single figure by Donatello. And the architecture of the niche

had been specifically designed to accommodate that single figure by Donatello. Well, a niche changed

ownership. You didn't know you could sell niches in a church, but you could. These were guild-supported.

One guild sold it to another. And at that time, Donatello's statue was removed, placed elsewhere,

and Verrocchio was commissioned to produce a two-figure group to put within it. It's an astonishingly

successful effort to accommodate two interactive figures to the small space while interpreting

the subject, a very visceral subject, with tact and dignity. The subject is, of course,

what we commonly call the Doubting Thomas. Thomas doubted the reality of the lance wound in the side

of Christ, of the resurrected Christ. So Christ invited him to test it with his finger. In this

interpretation, Thomas has not yet touched the wound. His hand, as you can see from this angle in the

photograph, his hand approaches but does not touch the wound, which Christ has exposed by pulling back

his drapery. Verrocchio had a preference in designing his figures for sculptural figures that had

organic movement, that in a sense turned on their own axis, that were full of movement in that sense,

in that contrapposto sense, moving with the weight on one foot and one leg supporting and the other leg

loose. And here he uses that design principle to help arrange these two figures in a crowded space.

Christ is placed back in the space, well back on the right-hand side. Thomas is so far forward that his

right foot projects outside the niche completely. In fact, I believe I'm right in saying that his

toe projects over the edge of the lintel which supports the niche. This gives it an astonishing

group of feeling, this group of feeling of reality, an astonishing

there-ness. It's as though you saw something in process. It is not the usual sculptural

reticence at all, but something that really seems to be moving from our space into

the space of the niche in this case. Yet everything here, in the acting out of this story, everything is

conducted with decorum and an appropriate moral earnestness. This group is an artistic triumph and I think one

may say it's a spiritual triumph as well. In Venice, between 1481, after 1481 and after his death in 1496,

this equestrian monument was erected. Verrocchio was preoccupied with this project

till the- at the end of his life and till his death and it was cast only after his death.

It is outside the church of St. Giovanni e Paolo, St. John and Paul in Venice. Not a major square,

but a major church, a very important church. This, of course, this project of 1481 approximately,

puts Verrocchio in direct historical competition with the legacy of Donatello's Gata Malata in nearby Padua.

This was also an equestrian monument to a condottiere. This one, Bartolomeo Coglioni.

The casting, as I say, was only accomplished 15 years later after the artist's death,

but the design work and the model for it were entirely his.

It offers an interesting contrast to the Gata Malata in pose or composition. You will recall that the Gata Malata of Donatello faces resolutely forward,

horse and rider alike. The Coglioni equestrian group is conceived with greater movement, a side-to-side

torsion. The horse's neck and head pulled to his left, while the general's right shoulder is pulled back

and his left shoulder advances, causing his head to appear to turn slightly left. It's really more

straight on, but he appears to be pulling it slightly to his left. He's ramrod straight in his stirrups and

saddle. The legs go straight up from the stirrups through the hips and through the torso of the figure,

and this is also in contrast to the Gata Malata whose feet are forward of his hips.

In fact, Verrocchio's Coglioni is larger, and I mean the rider, is larger and heavier in proportion

to his horse than is Donatello's Gata Malata. He wanted to be sure that the horse didn't dominate,

I think, in this case. And as a result, he doesn't refer to classical equestrian models,

such as the Marcus Aurelius in Rome. He enlarges his figure. He also does not refer,

and it's a little bit surprising, to the bronze horses of San Marco, or at least I don't detect

any notable similarity, even though they were right there in Venice. I don't think that he drew upon

them for specific poses. His group, Verrocchio's group, is flexible, more flexible than Donatello's,

more animated. Although the general had requested that the monument, which he left the money for,

be erected in Piazza San Marco, the most prominent spot in the city, near the Basilica and, of course,

near the Ducal Palace, the city fathers decided that the less prominent square beside Santi Giovanni

Paolo was more modestly appropriate. Remember that these condottieri were mercenary soldiers, and usually,

though not always outsiders, and I think frequently, the city fathers felt that they were perhaps

stretching above their rightful rank when they requested in their wills to have a tomb or a monument in a

particularly prominent spot. The forceful statue, however, is perfectly situated with the massive and

important church as its backdrop. I'm sorry you can't see the whole church, but it is a wonderful location on the

corner of the square by the church. Since he died, before he could oversee the casting and chase the cast bronze,

that is, take tools and do final both incisions and markings and polishings, various final work to the

to the finished cast bronze, it's not as subtle and accomplished in the details as it might have been,

but it remains a great achievement. And with Donatello, Verrocchio takes the prize for life-size renaissance

equestrian monuments. Quattrocento art offers hundreds of other examples of sculpture, especially in public and

ecclesiastical monuments like fountains, pulpits, baptismal fonts, pardon me, altar rails and tombs,

and many other kinds of decoration. Italy is rich in such sculpture. We've tasted a small sampling

in this lecture. We will be seeing more sculpture, but there is such an enormous feast of sculpture

in Italian renaissance art that I hope your appetite has been whetted to search out more of it. Thanks for

your attention.

Part 2

Years