_Donatello _
By: Neal Collenburg
Donatello Donatello’s real name is Donato di Niccolo di Betto Bardi
(1386-1466). Donatello was a master of sculpture in bronze and marble and was
one of the greatest Italian Renaissance artists of his time. A lot is known
about his life and career but little is known about his character and
personality. He never married and seems to be a man of simple tastes. Patrons
often found him hard to deal with and he demanded a lot of artistic freedom.
The inscriptions and signatures on his works are among the earliest examples
of classical Roman lettering. He had a more detailed range of knowledge of
ancient sculpture than any other artist of his time. His work was inspired by
ancient visual examples which he often transformed, he was really viewed as a
realist but later research showed he was much moreDonatello was the son of
Niccolo di Betto Bardi, a Florentine wool carder. It is not known how he
started his career but probably learned stone carving from one of the
sculptors working for the cathedral of Florence about 1400. Sometime between
1404 and 1407 he became a member of the workshop of Lorenzo Ghiberti who was a
sculptor in bronze. Donatello’s earliest work was a marble statue of David.
The “David” was originally made for the cathedral but was moved in 1416 to the
Palazzo Vecchio which is a city hall where it long stood as a civic patriotic
symbol. From the sixteenth century on it was eclipsed by the gigantic “David”
of Michelangelo which served the same purpose. Other of Donatello’s early
works which were still partly gothic are the impressive seated marble figure
of St. John the Evangelist for the cathedral and a wooden crucifix in the
church of Sta. Croce The full power of Donatello first appeared in two
marble statues, “St. Mark” and “St. George” which were completed in 1415. “St.
George” has been replaced and is now in the Bargello. For the first time the
human body is rendered as a functional organism. The same qualities came in
the series of five prophet statues that Donatello did beginning in 1416. The
statues were of beardless and bearded prophets as well as a group of Abraham
and Isaac in 1416-1421 and also the “Zuccone” and “Jeremiah”. “Zuccone” is
famous as the finest of the campanile statues and one of the artist’s
masterpieces. Donatello invented his own bold new mode of relief in his marble
panel “St. George Killing The Dragon” (1416-1417). The technique involved
shallow carving throughout, which created a more striking effect than in his
earlier works. He no longer modelled his shapes but he seemed to “paint” them
with his chisel Donatello continued to explore the possibilities of the new
technique he would use in his marble reliefs of the 1420’s and early 1430’s.
The best of these were “The Ascension, with Christ giving the keys to St.
Peter,” the “Feast of Herod” (1433-1435), the large stucco roundels with
scenes from the life of St. John the Evangelist (1434-1437), and the dome of
the old sacristy of St. Lorenzo shows the same technique but with color added.
Donatello had also become a major sculptor in bronze. His earliest work of
this was the more than life size statue of St. Louis (1423) which was replaced
half a century later. Donatello in partnership with Michelozzo helped with
fine bronze effigy on the tomb of the pope John XXIII in the bapistery, the
“Assumption of the Virgin” on the Brancacci tomb and the dancing angels on the
outdoor pulpit of the Prato Cathedral (1433-1438). His departure from the
standards of Brunelleschi did not go to well between the two old friends and
was never repaired. Brunelleschi even made epigrams against Donatello During
his partnership with Michelozzo, Donatello made works of pure sculpture,
including several works of bronze. The earliest and most important of these
was the “Feast of Herod” (1423-1427). He also made two statuettes of Virtues
and then three nude child angels (one which was stolen and is now in the
Berlin Museum). These statues prepared the way for the bronze statue of David,
the first large scale, freestanding nude statue of the Renaissance. It was the
most classical of Donatello’s works and was done for a private patron. Its
recorded history begins with the wedding of Lorenzo the magnificent in 1469,
when it was placed in the courtyard of Palazzo Vechio Whether the “David”
was requested by the Medici or not, Donatello worked for them (1433-1443),
producing sculptural decorations for the Old Sacristy in S. Lorenzo, the
Medici church. Works there included ten large reliefs in colored stucco and
two sets of small bronze doors which showed saints. In 1443 Donatello was
about to start work on two more bronze doors for the cathedral. He started
work on a statue of Erasmo da Narmi, called Gattamelata, who had died shortly
before. Donatello did most of the work on the statue between 1447 and 1450 but
the statue was not placed on the pedestal until 1453. It shows him in
classical armor, the baton of command in his raised right hand. This statue
was the ancestor of all the monuments erected since. Its fame was spread far
and wide. Even before it was on public view, the King of Naples wanted
Donatello to do the same kind of statue for him In the early 1450’s,
Donatello started to work on some important works for the Paduan church of St.
Antonio. These works included a bronze crucifix and a new high altar. His
richly decorated architectural works of marble and limestone include seven
life sized bronze statues, twenty-one bronze reliefs of various sizes, and a
large limestone relief, “Entombment of Christ.” The housing for these was
destroyed a century later and the present arrangement, dating from 1895 is
wrong historically. The Madonna and St. Francis are outstanding and the finest
of the reliefs are the four miracles of St. Anthony. Donatello was great in
handling large numbers of figures (one relief has more than one hundred) which
predicts the construction standards of the High Renaissance Donatello was
not doing much work the last three years at Padua, the work for the St.
Antonio altar was unpaid for and the Gattamelata monument not placed until
1453. Offers of other places reached him from Mantua, Modena, Ferrara, and
even Naples, but nothing came of them. He was clearly passing through a crisis
that prevented him from working. He was later quoted as saying that he almost
died “among those frogs in Padua.” In 1456 the Florentine physician Giovanni
Chellini noted he had successfully treated the master for a protracted
illness. Donatello only completed two works between 1450 and 1455, the wooden
statue “St. John the Baptist” and a figure of Mary Magdalen. Both works show
new reality, Donatello’s formerly powerful bodies have become withered and
spidery. When the “Magdalen” was damaged in the 1966 flood at Florence,
restoration work revealed the original painted surface, including realistic
flesh tones and golden highlights throughout the saint’s hair During his
absence, a new generation of sculptors who excelled in the treatment of marble
surfaces had rose in Florence. With the change in Florentine taste, all of
Donatello’s important requests came from outside Florence. They included the
bronze group “Judith and Holofernes” which is now standing before the Palazzo
Vecchio and a bronze statue of St. John the Baptist for Siena cathedral, also
undertook the work of the pair of bronze doors in the late 1450’s. This
project, which might have rivalled Ghiberti’s doors for the Florentine
baptistery, was abandoned about 1460 for unknown reasons The last years of
Donatello’s life were spent designing twin bronze pulpits for St. Lorenzo, and
again in the service of his old patrons the Medici, he died on December 13,
1466. These twin bronze pulpits covered with reliefs showing the passion of
Christ, are works of tremendous spiritual depth and complexity. Even though
some parts were left unfinished, they had to be completed by lesser artists.
_Bibliography _
1. 1998 Microsoft Encarta. Copyright 1993-1997 Microsoft Corporation. 2.
Craven, Thomas. “A Treasury of Art Masterpieces.” Copyright 1958 Simon and
Schuster Inc. New York, New York.
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