Page 259 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

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153 not i exhibition

154 not in exhibition

155
Donatello
(Donate di Niccolo di Betto Bardi)
Florentine, 1386-1466
THE SHOOTING OF SAINT SEBASTIAN

c. 1453
bronze, partially gilt
2
l
26 x 24 (io /4 x /2J
9
references: Kauffman 1935; Janson 1963; New York
1956, no. 46; Pope-Hennessy 1980, 93-95; Bobzr
and Rubenstein 1986, no. 34; Avery 1986, 14-18;
Boucher 1986; Florence 1986
Institut de France Musee Jacquemart-Andre, Paris

The remarkably wide technical, formal, and
expressive range of Donatello's documented work,
reflecting his highly flexible responses to the dif-
ferent media, subjects, patronage, functions, and
settings of each project, makes the attribution and
dating of undocumented work a perilous under-
taking. Opinions about the authenticity of this Saint Sebastian was especially revered as an the bows, and the "pock-marked" draperies. The
relief have varied widely, although its high quality intercessor in times of plague, and this small relief Apollonian character of the saint and the Hercu-
has generally been acknowledged. Following the may have been made for a private patron as an ex lean quality of the archers articulate similar
recent rediscovery of the Chellini Madonna (Vic- voto or as a kind of insurance policy. In no other classical references in the bronzes by Bertoldo
toria and Albert Museum, London), which is rendering of this subject—which, strictly speak- (cat. 164) and Pollaiuolo (cat. 162). M.K.
securely dated to 1456, there is now little reason ing, should not be called the "martyrdom" of
to hesitate in attributing the Jacquemart-Andre Saint Sebastian, since he miraculously survived
relief to Donatello himself and dating it to the the archers' assault —are the injured saint and his
period immediately after his return from Padua in assailants so starkly juxtaposed. The remarkable
1453. The two bronze reliefs have in common a motif of the angel rushing forward to console
compressed composition, a refinement of execu- Sebastian with the martyr's palm recalls the
tion, and the use of gilding. Equally characteristic expressive characterization of the pairs of proph-
of Donatello is the highly imaginative use of ets depicted by Donatello on his doors for the Old
antique prototypes. He has transformed the motif Sacristy of San Lorenzo. As in the San Lorenzo
of a bound Marsyas into the figure of the saint reliefs and statues for the high altar in the Santo
(e.g., Bober and Rubenstein 1986, no. 34) and has in Padua, the surface of the bronze has been
modeled the archers after the type of Roman war- worked to give a marked sense of textural dif- 156 not in exhibition
riors with braced legs commonly found on antique ferentiation between such features as the smooth
sarcophagi. Vasari recorded that Donatello had skin of the saint, the linear surface of the hair, the
restored an antique Marsyas. feathery wings of the angel, the coiled strings of

258 CIRCA 1492