Master Sculpture & Works of Art Part II

Master Sculpture & Works of Art Part II

View full screen - View 1 of Lot 554. Penitent Magdalene.

Giovan Francesco Rustici (Florence 1464 – 1554 Tours) or Benedetto Buglioni (Florence 1459/60 – 1521 Florence) Italian, Florence, circa 1510

Penitent Magdalene

Lot Closed

January 28, 07:55 PM GMT

Estimate

20,000 - 30,000 USD

Lot Details

Description

Giovan Francesco Rustici (Florence 1464 – 1554 Tours)

or

Benedetto Buglioni (Florence 1459/60 – 1521 Florence)

Italian, Florence, circa 1510

Penitent Magdalene


glazed terracotta

height 54in.; 137.3cm.

Private Collection, USA:
Sotheby's London, 7 December 1989, lot 64;
Morelli Collection, Florence;
Salander-O'Reilly Gallery, New York, 2005-2006.
G. Gentilini, I Della Robbia: la scultura invetriata nel Rinasciento, Florence, 1992, pp. 470-471, 481 and 489, no. 48 (illus.);
G. Gentilini, I Della Robbia- e l'arte nuova della scultura invetriata, exhibition catalogue, Fiesole 29 May - 1 November 1998, pp. 223 and 224, 11.28;
C. Cinelli in Cinelli, Myssok and Vossila, Il ciclo degli Apostoli nel Duomo di Firenze, Florence 2002, pp. 71, 73 and 126, figs. 16-18;
P. Sénéchal, Giovan Rustici 1475-1554, Paris 2007, p. 230, sr. 24a.

This extraordinarily powerful figure of Mary Magdalene is shown according to the standard iconography of a ‘penitent saint’: her body is withered by starvation and covered only by her long hair, the locks gathered into a belt on her stomach; her face, marked by the suffering of a hermit’s life, appears drawn and sorrowful as she prays for forgiveness. The stark realism of the image is striking, particularly in the anatomical precision. This effect is accentuated by the polychromy, which renders the figure more naturalistic with the pallor of the emaciated complexion, the purplish blush of the cheeks and knees, and the wild, almost mossy shade of the hair.

The theme of the Penitent Magdalene occurs frequently in Florentine Renaissance sculpture. The most famous examples are three large, life-sized wood statues by the major Florentine Renaissance protagonists: Brunelleschi, formerly in Santo Spirito (destroyed by fire in 1471); Donatello, in the Baptistery (datable to around 1455); and the figure begun by Desiderio da Settignano and completed by Benedetto da Maiano in Santa Trinita. During this same period, other wood sculptures were carved which, unlike these sophisticated expressions of Renaissance naturalism, are characterized instead by a hieratic simplicity in keeping with medieval taste. They were destined mainly for popular devotion in country churches.

The present sculpture is one of the few known examples of polychrome glazed statues portraying the Magdalene. Her dramatic, hollowed-out face is in contrast with the restrained melancholy of the traditional Della Robbia physiognomy and the use of impasto of the clay and the engobed glaze (a thick rose-colored slip) were not used by the Della Robbia and the Buglioni workshops. This work, therefore, constitutes a rare example of ‘pseudo-Robbian’ production of other Florentine sculptors, such as Benedetto da Maiano and Andrea Sansovino, Baccio da Montelupo, and Rustici himself, all of whom were influenced by the success and by the practical advantages of enameled terracotta (see J. Pope-Hennessy, “A relief of the Rape of Europe,” in Victoria and Albert Museum Yearbook, IV, 1974, pp. 11-19; M.G. Ciardi Dupré, G. F. Rustici, in Paragone, XIV, 1963, 157, pp. 29-50). A statement by Vasari (Le Vite…, 1568, ed. G. Milanesi, VI, p. 606) confirms Rustici’s interest in Robbian production, which is documented by the large glazed altarpiece in the Bargello.

Several stylistic analogies can be drawn between this Magdalene and the terracotta Magdalenes connected to the Rustici workshop, a group that is far from homogeneous, both for reasons of chronology and because of the presence of a number of collaborators working alongside the master. The first similarity can be found in the attentive, vigorously studied anatomy of the face and neck, constructed through a complex play of volumes and hollows. The unusually prominent eyebrows are also typical of Rustici’s sensibility. The square shape of the head is particularly akin to the heads in his reliefs of the Assumption of the Magdalene. The work also displays some resemblance—in the frozen tension of the pose, in the relationship of the neck and chin, and in the shape of the mouth—to a marble statue by Rustici of the Magdalene from 1515 in the Museo Civica in Pistoia. It seems therefore reasonable to propose an attribution of this Magdalene to Rustici's workshop (Florence, 1474-1554) with a dating to c. 1510.

During this period, aside from completing the famous bronze group at the Florentine baptistery depicting The Preaching of the Baptist, Rustici was occupied with a prolific clay production. However, we cannot ignore that the present statue has a distinct similarity to several sculptures by Benedetto Buglioni, particularly the figure in high relief from an overdoor lunette (Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, cf. Marquand, p. 19) and the predella panel on the altarpiece in the convent of Santa Elisabetta in Barga (cf. Marquand, p. 105). It is also mentioned in the Salander- O’Reilly catalogue (cf.) that the present work has a similar facture to a figure of Saint Sebastian which is now considered to by Buglioni. The modeling of their lower legs and feet, “strongly planar” calves and a ridge along the front of the legs is seen in other figures by Buglioni. Furthermore, the Saint Sebastian resembles the figure of the same saint in a shrine by Buglioni in Montemignaio (cf. Marquand, p. 77). There is no doubt that this sculpture reflects the direct influence of Verrocchio and Leonardo and may in fact depend on a model by Gian Francesco Rustici, Leonardo’s close friend.


RELATED LITERATURE:

A. Marquand, Benedetto and Santi Buglioni, New York, 1972 [reprint of Princeton, 1921];

F. Petrucci (D. Franklin ed.), in Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and the Renaissance in Florence exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 29 May – 5 September 2005, Ottawa, 2005, cat.no. 126, pp. 136-127.

We wish to thank Giancarlo Gentilini for sharing his research on this sculpture.