Page 262 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

Paduan painter, Squarcione, who died in 1469,
possessed "a cartoon" by Pollaiuolo with nude
figures, a fragment of which may survive in the
Fogg Museum, Harvard University (Ettlinger
1978, 36). A date in the mid-i46os for the engrav-
ing is therefore plausible. Even if its correct date
were in the next decade, it would still be notably
precocious as an overt image of naked men. The
Cleveland version of the engraving is a unique
survival of the earliest state known, before the
recutting of the plate (Richards 1968). The orig-
inal engraving of the plate is a technical tour de
force (Fusco 1973), and clearly owes much to the
artist's expertise as a metalworker (including
the chasing of incised decoration).
The subject of the engraving has occasioned
much debate. Some have claimed specific literary
sources, while others have seen it as a demonstra-
tion piece (either to promote Pollaiuolo's skills or
to instruct aspiring artists). None of the textual
sources (Ettlinger 1978,15) seems to fit the image
convincingly, and it is probably not an illustration
of a known story. The idea that it was designed as
an exemplary demonstration piece, to be copied by
artists who wished to acquire an advanced figure
style, has much to recommend it. A drawing by
Pollaiuolo in the Louvre, Paris, showing a nude
man from the front, side, and back, appears to
have performed just this function (Ettlinger 1978,
37). A number of artists, including Verrocchio,
by Cranach (cat. 158). The association of nymphs Almost every aspect of this remarkable engrav- Bertoldo, and Pollaiuolo himself, are recorded as
with Diana, the chaste goddess of the hunt, does ing—the largest of the Florentine fifteenth cen- having conceived compositions of fighting nudes
make it feasible that this is a portrait of an actual tury— is open to dispute, except its authorship. in a variety of media; these seem to have been
woman (Ottino della Chiesa 1956), but the facial Its date is problematic. Pollaiuolo's own testimony intended to show "anatomical" figures in stirring
features are typical of Luini's style and may in 1494 indicates that he had painted three large action. The engraving could almost serve as an
not depict a particular person. Like so many of the canvases of the almost nude Hercules in violent illustration of the variety of positions demanded
Italian pictures that ostensibly deal with the theme action (now lost) for the Medici in 1460. The in Alberti's De pictura (1435): "Everything that
of chastity, alternative aspects of the nymph's
appeal seem to come to the fore. As in Cranach's
pictures, the veils serve to draw attention to what
they fail to conceal, and the hints of discarded
clothing and jewelry suggest that the nymph
belongs as much to our own world as to the dis-
tant realms of myth. M.K.

i6o

Antonio Pollaiuolo
Florentine, 1431/1432-1498
BATTLE OF THE NUDES

c. 1465
engraving
11
1
42.8x6i.8(i6 /i6X24 /
inscribed: OPVS ANTONII POLLA/IOLI HORENT/TINI
references: Hind 1938, 1:9; Richards 1968; Fusco
1973; Ettlinger 1978, 15, 36, 37; Emison 1990; Kemp
1
Z99 / 43
Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge,
Gift of Francis Bullard in Memory of His Uncle
Charles Eliot Norton

EUROPE AND THE MEDITERRANEAN WORLD 261