A Wanderer in FlorenceLucas, E. V. (Edward Verrall)
History
A Wanderer in Florence
Lucas, E. V. (Edward Verrall)
Art -- Italy -- Florence; Florence (Italy) -- Description and travel
The Donatello collection in the Bargello has been made representative
by the addition of casts. The originals number ten: there is also
a cast of the equestrian statue of Gattemalata at Padua, which is,
I suppose, next to Verrocchio's Bartolommeo Colleoni at Venice, the
finest equestrian statue that exists; heads from various collections,
including M. Dreyfus' in Paris, although Dr. Bode now gives that
charming example to Donatello's pupil Desiderio; and various
other masterpieces elsewhere. But it is the originals that chiefly
interest us, and first of these in bronze is the David, of which I
have already spoken, and first of these in marble the S. George. This
George is just such a resolute, clean, warlike idealist as one dreams
him. He would kill a dragon, it is true; but he would eat and sleep
after it and tell the story modestly and not without humour. By a
happy chance the marble upon which Donatello worked had light veins
running through it just where the head is, with the result that the
face seems to possess a radiance of its own. This statue was made for
Or San Michele, where it used to stand until 1891, when the present
bronze replica that takes its place was made. The spirited marble
frieze underneath it at Or San Michele is the original and has been
there for centuries. It was this S. George whom Ruskin took as the
head and inspiration of his Saint George's Guild.
The David is interesting not only in itself but as being the first
isolated statue of modern times. It was made for Cosimo de' Medici,
to stand in the courtyard of the Medici palace (now the Riccardi),
and until that time, since antiquity, no one had made a statue to
stand on a pedestal and be observable from all points. Hitherto modern
sculptors had either made reliefs or statues for niches. It was also
the first nude statue of modern times; and once again one has the
satisfaction of recognizing that the first was the best. At any rate,
no later sculptor has made anything more charming than this figure,
or more masterly within its limits.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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