DONATELLO (1386-1466), the diminutive of Donato, was the son of Niccolo Bardi, and was born in Florence in 1386. In the struggle between the rival parties of the Albizzi and the Medici, the father took part with the former, and was involved in their ruin. He must have been a man of considerable property, judging from the decree by which his houses are confiscated. His son Donatello found protection and shelter and the means of early training from the Martelli family, and to this connection must be ascribed Donatello’s introduction to the great Cosmo de’ Medici, pater patrice, who during the life-long relation between himself and the artist, did everything to efface, by kindness towards the son, the recollection of the sufferings which the house of Medici had inflicted on the father. He learned the goldsmith’s trade under the father of the renowned Lorenzo Ghiberti, and the goldsmith’s trade then included all kinds of bronze creations. At the age of seventeen he set out for Rome with his friend Brunellesco. At Rome the two young men maintained themselves by working as goldsmiths during the first half of the week, devoting the second half to the study of the ancient monuments, and to making excavations in search of lost works of art. The Romans, we are told, believed them to be treasure-seekers. The Romans of Donatello’s time still reflected the feelings with which their forefathers, nearly three centuries before, had wondered when the agents of Henry of Blois, bishop of Winchester, dug up and carried away from their city similar artistic treasures. On their return to Florence, rich in artistic knowledge and treasures, the careers commenced in which Brunellesco was destined to hang above the Florence cathedral the dome of the Pantheon, and Donatello to impart to ...the multitudinous creations of his chisel the truthfulness and grace and power for which he was so largely indebted to his ancient models. There exist 40 works of Donatello of unquestioned authenticity, and 31 respecting which controversies have arisen; and 25, recorded by his contemporaries but no longer found, must be added to the number. When it is borne in mind that many of these works are life-size or colossal statues, o∙r large bas-reliefs crowded with figures, an idea may be formed of the extent of his labours, prosecuted untiringly during a life which extended to eighty years. He was fortunate in the precise period of his labours. During the whole of the previous century Florentine art had concentrated its efforts on the creation of its grand architectural monuments. In the second half of the 15th century sculpture was cultivated, but chiefly to adorn the palaces and gratify the vanity of the rich. Donatello, placed between the two periods, could devote his genius to the execution of the great plastic works required for the completion and adornment of the public buildings of the state. Hence the statues of the church of St Michele, those on Giotto’s belfry, the pulpit of St Lorenzo, those in the baptistry, as well as all the other works which still remain exactly where first placed—unhappily no longer the case with the St George—possess an exceptional beauty; for no sculptor ever studied more carefully than Donatello the exact relation of a work to its local destination. The varied and characteristic elements of Donatello’s art, what he borrowed from the antique, what peculiar tricks of drapery he took from his immediate predecessors, how, from his first habit of painting his figures he passed into a phase of purely sculptured effects, how he was influenced by his friend Brunellesco in his treatment of proportion and perspective, how he imparted a more pictorial character by the greater flatness of the figures to his bas-reliefs, all this forms one of the most interesting chapters in the history of Renaissance sculpture. Besides Florence he worked also at Rome, Padua, Venice, Siena, Modena, Mantua, and Ferrara; and he visited Rome a second time. In Padua he produced, in 1432, the equestrian statue of Gattainelata with some minor works, and as almost his latest work we may consider the statue of St Louis of France, executed for St Croce. To English students of art it may be satisfactory to learn that, in the opinion of Semper, the South Kensington museum possesses seven undoubted specimens of Donatello, besides one, the Magdalen seated on clouds, probably by a scholar, and a virgin and child of doubtful origin. Donatello, though best known as a sculptor, was likewise a painter,— at least was admitted as such into the academy of St Lucca in 1412. We find him paid for architectural drawings and opinions respecting the dome of the Florence cathedral in 1420, and he was sent as military engineer to the siege of Lucca in 1430. His first trade of goldsmith was never abandoned. Thus varied and versatile, we cannot but form the highest opinion of one respecting whom Vasari has said that he threw the same love of art into every work great or small, and that he always did more than he promised. His life-long attachment to his patron Cosmo was only equalled by his lavish kindness to his friends; for we read that the large sums received by him were kept in an open box in his workshop, and that his friends when wanting money were invited and expected to help themselves, no questions being asked or receipts given. In his last years he was provided for by Piero, the son of Cosmo. He died at Florence in 1466. Donatello’s greatest works, his Baptist, David, Judith, St George, and Mark, are declared by some recent critics not to rise into the highest sphere of true Christian art. The sculptor, we are told, wanted the deep faith of Michelangelo. Perhaps the best corrective of this criticism is the language of Michelangelo himself, who, when gazing with generous admiration on the St Mark, exclaimed, “So noble a figure could indeed write a gospel.”
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