Madonna and Child
c.1420/1425
Sculptor, Florentine, c. 1386 - 1466
With this terra-cotta statue, slightly under life-size, we encounter figures that demonstrate the beginnings of the Italian Renaissance admiration for the human body. Earlier statues in the collection, like the Pisan Annunciation pair, The Archangel Gabriel and The Virgin Annunciate, present the figure as a relatively simple and static form, with drapery arranged in graceful, decorative patterns that tell little about the body it covers. Here, while some decorative folds remain, the clothes work more effectively to describe the form and movement of the body beneath them. Projecting folds wrap around Mary's bent right leg, and deep pockets of space penetrate the sculptural mass, articulating the figure of a young woman with the strength to move vigorously in her heavy garments and support a sturdy child. For a fifteenth-century audience, the child's nudity would have represented Christ's humility in entering the world as a small, poor, and helpless human being.
The mother, whose costume details recall ancient sculpture -- classical sandals, a fillet around the head, and palmette ornament on the sleeve cuffs -- shares much with images conceived by the Florentine master Donatello (1385/86-1466), the greatest sculptor of the early Renaissance.
West Building Main Floor, Gallery 5
Artwork overview
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Medium
painted and gilded terracotta
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Credit Line
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Dimensions
overall: 120.8 x 47.2 x 33.5 cm (47 9/16 x 18 9/16 x 13 3/16 in.)
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Accession
1937.1.112
Artwork history & notes
Provenance
Pazzi family, Florence.[1] Count Giacomo Michelozzi, Tavarnelle, Florence;[2] (Luigi Grassi, Florence); purchased by 20 May 1921 by Henry Goldman [1857-1937], New York.[3] (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London and New York); purchased 26 April 1937 by The A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh;[4] gift 1937 to NGA.
[1] According to the 1922 catalogue of the Goldman collection (see note 3), the sculpture is "from a private chapel in one of the palaces belonging to the Pazzi family in Florence."
[2] The Duveen prospectus for the painting (in NGA curatorial files) describes the sculpture as having been made originally for one of the Pazzi family palaces, and then owned by Michelozzi, "in whose family it had remained for over a century."
[3] Letter of 20 May 1921 from Henry Goldman to Joseph Duveen. (Duveen Brothers Records, accession number 960015, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, Series II, box. 457, folder 1, copy in NGA curatorial records. See GRI for digitized copies.) This letter was kindly brought to the NGA’s attention by Fabio Gaffo; see his emails of 14 October 2021 and 2 November 2021 to Alison Luchs in NGA curatorial files. The sculpture appeared in the Goldman catalogue published a year later. Wilhelm R. Valentiner. The Henry Goldman Collection, New York, 1922: no. 4
[4] Mellon collection records, in NGA curatorial files.
Associated Names
Exhibition History
2022
Donatello: Il Rinascimento, Palazzo Strozzi e Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence, 2022, no. 2.8, repro., as by Donatello (or after Donatello?).
Donatello: Inventor of the Renaissance, Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2022, no. 10, repro., as Donatello (or after Donatello?).
2023
Donatello: Sculpting the Renaissance, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, no. 1.5, repro., as by Donatello or a follower.
Bibliography
1921
Bode, Wilhelm von. "Eine Unbekannte Madonnenstatue Donatellos." Kunst und Kunstler 19(April 1921): 238, repro.
1940
Valentiner, Wilhelm R. "Donatello and Ghiberti." The Art Quarterly III, no. 2 (Spring 1940): 196-203, fig. 15.
1941
Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 222-223, no. A-1, as by Donatello.
1942
Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 253, repro. 228, as by Donatello.
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. 9-13, as by Donatello.
1949
Paintings and Sculpture from the Mellon Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1949 (reprinted 1953 and 1958): 148, repro., as by Donatello.
Seymour, Charles. Masterpieces of Sculpture from the National Gallery of Art. Washington and New York, 1949: 174, note 15, repro. 59, 61-63, as by Donatello.
1951
Hartt, Frederick. 'Review: Charles Seymour Jr., Masterpieces of Sculpture from the National Gallery of Art." College Art Journal 10 (Winter 1951): 205.
Pope-Hennessy, John. 'Review: Masterpieces of Sculpture from the National Gallery of Art by Charles Seymour." The Burlington Magazine 93, no. 576 (March 1951): 98.
1964
Pope-Hennessy, John, assisted by Ronald Lightbown. Catalogue of Italian Sculpture in the Victoria and Albert Museum. 3 vols. London, 1964: 1:423, 688-691, repro.
1965
Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 153, as by Donatello.
1968
National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 136, repro., as by Donatello.
1984
Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 623, no. 962, repro.
1991
Kopper, Philip. America's National Gallery of Art: A Gift to the Nation. New York, 1991: 108-109, color repro.
1992
National Gallery of Art. National Gallery of Art, Washington. New York, 1992: 282, repro.
1994
Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1994: 85, repro.
2002
Darr, Alan, Peter Barnet, and Antonia Boström. Catalogue of Italian Sculptures in the Detroit Institute of Arts. 2 vols. London, 2002: 1:91.
2018
Caglioti, Francesco, Laura Cavazzini, Aldo Galli, and Neville Rowley. "Reconsidering the Young Donatello." Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 57 (2015, published 10 August 2018): 23, 30 fig. 22, 38, 40.
2025
Luchs, Alison, and Daphne Barbour. "Donatello and the Mellon Madonna: interpreting the execution of Donatello's designs." Sculpture Journal 34, no.1 (2025): 13-31, figs. 1, 3, 5, 8-11a-b, 12a-b, 13, 19.
Wikidata ID
Q63809373