74,5 cm × 73 cm × 6,5 cm (29,3 in × 27,3 in × 26 in)
Location
Bode-Museum, Sculpture Collection and Museum of Byzantine Art, Berlin
Owner
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
The Pazzi Madonna is a rectangular "stiacciato" marble relief sculpture by Donatello, since 1886 in the sculpture collections of the Bode-Museum in Berlin.[1][2] Dating to around 1420 and 1425[3] at the beginning of Donatello's collaboration with Michelozzo, it was most likely produced for private devotion and possibly commissioned by the Pazzi family for their home in Florence.[4] The composition was very popular and is known in several copies.
The half figure of Virgin Mary is shown in three-quarter-view, the faces of both mother and child are in profile, with her leaning towards the Christ Child and touching his forehead, her silhouette slightly obscuring his. She holds the baby with her left arm, the hand with braced fingers perspectivally foreshortened, the right hand softly pressing against its shoulder. Neither of them are shown with halos and the emphasis is instead on their tender and intense intimacy, developing themes from the Eleusa-type icon in Byzantine art. The smiling child reaches out his arm to his mother, but their expressions often are described as melancholy, with the suggestion that the Virgin is reflecting on her son's future Passion.
Relief in frame as displayed
Close-up of heads
Detail in lateral view
Copy in architectural framing all'antica, Paris, Louvre (Inv. RF 744)
^Catalogue entry with extensive text by Neville Rowley and bibliography.
^(in Italian) AA.VV., La collezione di sculture al Bode-Museum, Prestel, Monaco di Baviera, 2011. ISBN 978-3-7913-4260-3
^Coonin, p. 101–103, ca. 1420 according to Berlin online catalogue, the most recent catalogues for the major 2022 exhibition in Florence (cat. 4.1, p. 170) and Berlin (cat. 14, p. 150) state ca. 1422.
^Rolf C. Wirtz, Donatello, Masters of Italian Art series, Könemann, Cologne 1998. ISBN 3-8290-0244-0 p. ??.
The PazziMadonna is a rectangular "stiacciato" marble relief sculpture by Donatello, since 1886 in the sculpture collections of the Bode-Museum in Berlin...
The Casa PazziMadonna is a fresco fragment by Andrea del Castagno, created in 1443, originally the altarpiece of the chapel of Santa Brigida at the castello...
Sant'Angelo a Nilo, Naples, (1426-1428, see below), the Madonna of the Clouds and PazziMadonna, both c. 1425−1430 and domestic pieces respectively with...
carving technique. His other works in the genre include the so-called PazziMadonna (around 1420–30), The Feast of Herod for the Siena Baptistery (1423–27)...
suggestions from Donatello's PazziMadonna, Tempi Madonna, or Michelangelo's Taddei Tondo, Small Cowper Madonna or Bridgewater Madonna. From Leonardo, Raphael...
her face to her son's, a pose drawn from Donatello, particularly his PazziMadonna. Her expression is pensive and melancholic, perhaps foreseeing her son's...
expulsion of the Medici and return of the Pazzi family in 1494. Another lost work was a tondo of the Madonna ordered by a Florentine banker in Rome to...
Canova, Equestrian Monument to Charles III, c. 1807–1819 Donatello, PazziMadonna, c. 1422, Bode-Museum, Berlin Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Ecstasy of Saint...
frescoed a crucifixion, commissioned in 1493 for Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi, Florence (the Pazzi Crucifixion). The attribution to him of the painting of the marriage...
Sun (Godstow Press, 2005), a literary novel set in Florence during the Pazzi Conspiracy, adheres closely to known facts. Filippino features as the closest...
dei Candeli Santa Maria della Croce al Tempio Santa Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi Santa Maria Maggiore Santa Maria de' Ricci Santa Maria Novella Santa Maria...
in the series Twelve Apostles gracing the pristine surfaces of the small Pazzi Chapel (1443–1450) in Florence, della Robbia's reliefs in this medium achieved...
the Medici and the Roman branches of the Cybo and Altoviti families. The Pazzi conspiracy of 1478 was an attempt to depose the Medici family by killing...
Ferri. In the former convent of the site lived and died Saint Magdalena de Pazzi (1566–1607), born to a noble Florentine family. She was renowned for her...
Pazzi Conspiracy in 1478), surmounted by three sculptures. In the center is Michelangelo's statue of Madonna and Child (known as the Medici Madonna)...
sons didn't survive to adulthood: Bianca (1445–1505): Married Guglielmo Pazzi. Lucrezia (1448–1493): Known as Nannina. Married Bernardo Rucellai. Lorenzo...
spiritual headquarters of the order. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene de' Pazzi, a revered authority on Carmelite spirituality, wrote that devotion to Our...
Global Information
Relief in frame as displayed
Close-up of heads
Detail in lateral view
Copy in architectural framing all'antica, Paris, Louvre (Inv. RF 744)
