The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of April 20, 2024

Madonna and Child

Madonna and Child

c. 1450
(Italian, 1378–1455)
Italy, Florence, 15th century
polychromed terracotta
Overall: 81.3 x 59 x 21.6 cm (32 x 23 1/4 x 8 1/2 in.)
Gift of Leonard C. Hanna, Jr., for the Coralie Walker Hanna Memorial Collection 1939.161
Location: 117B Italian Renaissance

Description

This half-length Madonna represents one of the finest of about 40 surviving variants, all of which display many characteristics of the Florentine bronze sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti. These features include serene facial types with narrow eyes and thin eyebrows, the careful arrangement of the Madonna and Child, forehead to cheek, and the infant's twisting pose. The popularity of this devotional relief began around 1420 and continued until around 1500. Ghiberti was the most successful bronze sculptor of the early Renaissance in Florence. His fame rests upon the commissions he received for two sets of bronze doors, completed between 1401 and 1424, for the Baptistry in Florence. The reclining figure of Eve on the base of this Madonna and Child (suggesting Mary as the new Eve) stems from a similar figure on the upper left door of the Porta del Paradiso, the second set of Baptistry doors. Eve's presence on the base clearly substantiates the attribution to Ghiberti and helps date the relief.
  • Leonard C. Hanna, Jr., by gift to the Cleveland Museum of Art, 1939.
  • The Art of Devotion: Panel Painting in Early Renaissance Italy. Middlebury College Museum of Art, Middlebury, VT (organizer) (September 17-December 13, 2009); Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA (February 9-May 31, 2010).
    Middlebury College Museum of Art, Middlebury, VT (9/17/2009 - 12/13/2009) and Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA (2/9/2010 - 5/31/2010): "The Art of Devotion: Panel Painting in Early Renaissance Italy"exh. cat. no. 12, p. 98-99.
    also to: Kimbell Museum of Art, Fort Worth, TX, February 24-April 27, 1986.
    The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI, Italian Renaissance Sculpture in the Time of Donatello, October 21, 1985-January 5, 1986
    Florence and the Arts: Five Centuries of Patronage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 13-September 19, 1971).
    CMA 1971: Florence and the Arts - Five Centuries of Patronage," repr. cat. no. 19.
  • {{cite web|title=Madonna and Child|url=false|author=Lorenzo Ghiberti|year=c. 1450|access-date=20 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1939.161