Astorgio Manfredi

1455

Mino da Fiesole

Artist, Florentine, 1429 - 1484

The head and shoulders of a cleanshaven man are carved from white marble lightly streaked in gray in this freestanding sculpture. In this view, the shoulders are square to us, but he turns his head to our right. His left eyebrow, to our right, appears to cocked as he looks into the distance, and he has a sweeping nose with a rounded tip. His long upper lip overhangs the lower lip in a slight overbite. His hair is parted down the middle and ends in curls that angle from eye-level framing his forehead to ear-level at the back of his neck. He wears a high-collared breastplate over linked mail. The breastplate is ornamented with bands of flowers, dots, and other geometric designs. A strap and buckle hang from the neck area. The sculpture ends in a blunt, straight edge across the bottom, and it rests on a brown stone pedestal in front of a gray background.

Media Options

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This work represents one of the first independent portrait busts made in Europe since antiquity, reflecting Mino da Fiesole's reinvention of the portrait bust as an artistic type, first in Florence and then elsewhere.

A Latin inscription carved on the underside identifies the subject and artist: "Astorgio Manfredi II, lord of Faenza, 42 years old, 1455, the work of Nino." Astorgio by this time had been ruler of Faenza for seven years and a military commander for almost 25. He is immortalized with starkly unidealized realism, his power conveyed by a brocaded mantle over field armor consisting of a chain mail shirt and metal breast plate fastened with a worn leather strap.

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 5

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    marble

  • Credit Line

    Widener Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 51.5 x 54.2 x 27.7 cm (20 1/4 x 21 5/16 x 10 7/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1942.9.135

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Louis-Charles Timbal [1821-1880], Paris.[1] Baron Arthur de Schickler [1828-1919], Paris, and Martinvast, Normandy (near Cherbourg); by inheritance to his daughter, Marguerite, Comtesse Hubert de Pourtalès [1870-1956], Paris, and Martinvast, Normandy; sold April 1919 to (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris) in part-share agreement with (Wildenstein & Co., Inc., New York) and (Arnold Seligmann & Co., Paris);[2] inheritance from Estate of Peter A.B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, after purchase 13 January 1922 by funds of the Estate;[3] gift 1942 to NGA.
[1] Duveen Sculpture in Public Collections of America, New York, 1944: no. 108, repro.
[2] The Baron's daughter married Comte Hubert de Pourtalès in 1890, and was her father's sole heiress. Edward Fowles (Memories of Duveen Brothers, London, 1976: 102-103, 134) discusses the original purchase agreement with Wildenstein and Seligmann, and the subsequent 1922 distribution of the works among the three dealers.
[3] Provenance according to Widener card files in NGA curatorial records.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1976

  • Masterpieces of World Art from American Museums from Ancient Egyptian to Contemporary Art, The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo; The Kyoto National Museum, Japan, 1976, no. 18.

Bibliography

1942

  • Works of Art from the Widener Collection. Foreword by David Finley and John Walker. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 8.

1943

  • Swarzenski, Georg. "Some Aspects of Italian Renaissance Sculpture in the National Gallery." Gazette des Beaux-Arts 6th series, 24 (September 1943): 154 fig. 3.

1944

  • Duveen Brothers, Inc. Duveen Sculpture in Public Collections of America: A Catalog Raisonné with illustrations of Italian Renaissance Sculptures by the Great Masters which have passed through the House of Duveen. New York, 1944: figs. 108-111.

1948

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Widener Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1948 (reprinted 1959): 120, repro.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 163.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 144, repro.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 625, no. 965, repro.

1994

  • Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1994: 153, repro.

1999

  • Norman Herz, Katherine A. Holbrow and Shelley G. Sturman. "Marble Sculture in the National Gallery of Art: a Provenance Study." In Max Schvoerer, ed. Archéomatériaux: marbres et autres roches: ASMOSIA IV, Bordeaux, France 9-13 october 1995: actes de la IVème Conférence international de l’Association pour l’étude des marbres et autres roches utilizes dans le passé. Talence, 1999: 101-110.

2000

  • National Gallery of Art Special Issue. Connaissance des Arts. Paris, 2000:59.

Inscriptions

on bottom and inside of base: ASTORGIVS.MANFREDVS./ SECVDVS.FAVENTIE.DOMINVS / ANNO.XLII.ETATIS.SVE / 1455 / OPVS.NINI

Wikidata ID

Q63809893

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