Presents, a Life with a Plan. My name is Karen Anastasia Placek, I am the author of this Google Blog. This is the story of my journey, a quest to understanding more than myself. The title of my first blog delivered more than a million views!! The title is its work as "The Secret of the Universe is Choice!; know decision" will be the next global slogan. Placed on T-shirts, Jackets, Sweatshirts, it really doesn't matter, 'cause a picture with my slogan is worth more than a thousand words, it's worth??.......Know Conversation!!!
Why does KRON and every other Local Media Station on television and/or radio that has a show on between the hours of 7- 9 A.M. not have a time-slot that works as a reminder that it is Street Cleaning day? The News used to go-off at 9 a.m. and that was the big que to move the cars and now there is not a reminder as the shows just blast-over that hour and into the terrible 10 O'clock oops, wow or phew.
Made me wonder as the television has no weekly T.V. Guide to plan our shows and I continue to miss the new shows in the evening however that is sort of dumb now as the shows were at one time meant to be evening Soap Opera's and that fell by the wayside as all those Hollywood actors and actresses are spoiled and believe it should all be pre-recorded and those actors and actresses complained that their to good to be paid so little, blah, blah, blah. Long story short, the shows in the evening and the T.V. and radio are Wall Street betting on the Futures so that their hand is the only hand at the table of entertainment however they're not helping anyone but themselves. Would it not be terrible if somebody looked into it and found out that 'Friends' was meant to be like 'The Days of our Lives' or 'General Hospital' and should still be on television every single weekday?
Hindsight being 20/20 I bet that the 'Friends' cast wishes that they had never complained as their mostly unemployed now, shocker? No, it is as Wall Street and that big sell, or not.
We clean about ninety percent of San Francisco streets with mechanical sweepers. We cover 150,000 curb miles and remove 25,000 tons of litter and debris ...
The basis of ravage is in
the artwork that is shown at locale, the Museum.This
is where the history of our World has disgraced our integrity in such manners
that the obvious has been hidden in plain sight for all Mankind to see such
terraces at their leisure.Pine among
these portions and the oats of bells and whistles will indeed brave your mind
and enter your brain as your legs may collapse. Prepare yourself for the
inevitable as the Times in Ages, the Renaissance; this is Florence in lathe as
the shingle is but a roof for the ceiling that was made to tile the floors that
you must stand to not harbor, for the pier is merely called in as the paint by
number.
Discussion of rape under
the age of verbiage is left to the Artist by expression through the mold
itself.Self-acknowledgement grabs at
the waste of forced as the chisel, pencil and/or paints scribe in strokes to
the anchor of its realm.The age of two
years old graces our human lives and for the words that are not in our language
our compass holds to the height of which will deliver in full bore rest to
stand the still shot as the picture is the plot.With small fortune humanity has drooled over
the Statue of David and the glaring eyes of his warn, perhaps today a template
of modern day logic will create no problem as the fixture of the Statue of
David is it’s light, Occam’s razor.
The Statue of David a
well-recorded bit of history has forlorn Man to brace the mind and also to
describe the offense at the age of regard.A pitched view of sodomy to that giant of a boy would have delivered the
Statue of David in marble at the size of what would have been the view of Michelangelo himself, flat on his back. This formal scribe at the study would have
suppressed the reality to live, as a victim often translates the flight as a
bird and the fright as the freeze as seen in the adult burst of brilliance to say "set in stone".To paint, to sculpt, to draw, to even
consider playing an instrument of choice as in the unexplained prodigy is again
in description of times with no words.
These are the honest horrors
of my own life as the recognition of what has happened in my life has been left
to dismiss by a curtsy.The “life goes
on” is a common fountain of a penned response and as such I chose to say that
life is a bit of a shock and now as the tourist goes to a museum instead of
staring and staring at the bizarre you may consider the facts, descriptions are
described bringing dust to dust, ashes to ashes to the modern paints to drawn
via the moldings and the frames.
Hajek, Nicolaus J. (2015) "Still a Rivalry: Contrasting Renaissance Sodomy ... major cities established specialized ministries for tackling the issue: among them,.
Oct 3, 2016 - Sodomy was so pervasive in Renaissance Florence. ... To deal with this “problem,” Florence established a special office called The Ufficiali di ...
David is a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture created in marble between 1501 and 1504 by the Italian artist Michelangelo. David is a 5.17-metre (17.0 ft)[a]marble statue of a standing male nude. The statue represents the Biblical hero David, a favoured subject in the art of Florence.[1] David was originally commissioned as one of a series of statues of prophets to be positioned along the roofline of the east end of Florence Cathedral,
but was instead placed in a public square, outside the Palazzo Vecchio,
the seat of civic government in Florence, in the Piazza della Signoria
where it was unveiled on 8 September 1504. The statue was moved to the Galleria dell'Accademia, Florence, in 1873, and later replaced at the original location by a replica.
3D model
Because of the nature of the hero it represented, the statue soon
came to symbolize the defence of civil liberties embodied in the Republic of Florence, an independent city-state threatened on all sides by more powerful rival states and by the hegemony of the Medici family. The eyes of David, with a warning glare, were turned towards Rome.[2]
The history of the statue begins before Michelangelo's work on it from 1501 to 1504.[3] Prior to Michelangelo's involvement, the Overseers of the Office of Works of Florence Cathedral, consisting mostly of members of the influential woolen cloth guild, the Arte della Lana, had plans to commission a series of twelve large Old Testament sculptures for the buttresses of the cathedral.[4] In 1410 Donatello made the first of the statues, a figure of Joshua in terracotta. A figure of Hercules, also in terracotta, was commissioned from the Florentine sculptor Agostino di Duccio in 1463 and was made perhaps under Donatello's direction.[5] Eager to continue their project, in 1464, the Operai contracted Agostino to create a sculpture of David. A block of marble was provided from a quarry in Carrara, a town in the Apuan Alps in northern Tuscany. Agostino only got as far as beginning to shape the legs, feet and the torso, roughing out some drapery
and probably gouging a hole between the legs. His association with the
project ceased, for reasons unknown, with the death of Donatello in
1466, and ten years later Antonio Rossellino was commissioned to take up where Agostino had left off.
Rossellino's contract was terminated soon thereafter, and the
block of marble remained neglected for 26 years, all the while exposed
to the elements in the yard of the cathedral workshop. This was of great
concern to the Opera authorities, as such a large piece of
marble not only was costly but represented a large amount of labour and
difficulty in its transportation to Florence. In 1500, an inventory of
the cathedral workshops described the piece as "a certain figure of
marble called David, badly blocked out and supine."[6] A year later, documents showed that the Operai
were determined to find an artist who could take this large piece of
marble and turn it into a finished work of art. They ordered the block
of stone, which they called The Giant, "raised on its feet" so that a master experienced in this kind of work might examine it and express an opinion. Though Leonardo da Vinci and others were consulted, it was Michelangelo, only 26 years old, who convinced the Operai
that he deserved the commission. On 16 August 1501, Michelangelo was
given the official contract to undertake this challenging new task.[7]
He began carving the statue early in the morning on 13 September, a
month after he was awarded the contract. He would work on the massive
statue for more than two years.
On 25 January 1504, when the sculpture was nearing completion,
Florentine authorities had to acknowledge there would be little
possibility of raising the more than six-ton statue to the roof of the
cathedral.[8] They convened a committee of 30 Florentine citizens that comprised many artists, including Leonardo da Vinci and Sandro Botticelli, to decide on an appropriate site for David.[9]
While nine different locations for the statue were discussed, the
majority of members seem to have been closely split between two sites.
One group, led by Giuliano da Sangallo and supported by Leonardo and Piero di Cosimo, among others, believed that, due to the imperfections in the marble, the sculpture should be placed under the roof of the Loggia dei Lanzi on Piazza della Signoria; the other group thought it should stand at the entrance to the Palazzo della Signoria, the city's town hall (now known as Palazzo Vecchio). Another opinion, supported by Botticelli, was that the sculpture should be situated on or near the cathedral. In June 1504, David was installed next to the entrance to the Palazzo Vecchio, replacing Donatello's bronze sculpture of Judith and Holofernes,
which embodied a comparable theme of heroic resistance. It took four
days to move the statue the half mile from Michelangelo's workshop into
the Piazza della Signoria. Later that summer the sling and tree-stump
support were gilded, and the figure was given a gilded loin-garland.[10][11]
In 1873, the statue of David was removed from the piazza, to protect it from damage, and displayed in the Accademia Gallery, Florence, where it attracted many visitors. A replica was placed in the Piazza della Signoria in 1910.[12]
In 1991, a mentally disturbed artist named Piero Cannata attacked the statue with a hammer he had concealed beneath his jacket;[13] in the process of damaging the toes of the left foot, he was restrained.[14]
On 12 November 2010, a fiberglass replica[15] of the David was installed on the roofline of Florence Cathedral, for one day only. Photographs of the installation reveal the statue the way the Operai who commissioned the work originally expected it to be seen.
In 2010, a dispute over the ownership of David arose when,
based on a legal review of historical documents, the municipality of
Florence claimed ownership of the statue in opposition to the Italian
Culture Ministry, which disputes the municipality claim.[16][17]
In the mid 1800s, small cracks were noticed on the left leg on David which can possibly be attributed to an uneven sinking of the ground under the massive statue.[18]
The pose of Michelangelo's David is unlike that of earlier Renaissance depictions of David. The bronze statues by Donatello and Verrocchio represented the hero standing victorious over the head of Goliath, and the painter Andrea del Castagno had shown the boy in mid-swing, even as Goliath's head rested between his feet,[19] but no earlier Florentine artist had omitted the giant altogether. According to Helen Gardner and other scholars, David is depicted before his battle with Goliath.[20][21] Instead of being shown victorious over a foe much larger than he, David looks tense and ready for combat.
The statue appears to show David after he has made the decision
to fight Goliath but before the battle has actually taken place, a
moment between conscious choice and action. His brow is drawn, his neck
tense and the veins bulge out of his lowered right hand. His left hand
holds a sling that is draped over his shoulder and down to his right
hand, which holds a rock.[22] The twist of his body effectively conveys to the viewer the feeling that he is in motion, an impression heightened with contrapposto.
The statue is a Renaissance interpretation of a common ancient Greek
theme of the standing heroic male nude. In the High Renaissance,
contrapposto poses were thought of as a distinctive feature of antique
sculpture. This is typified in David, as the figure stands with
one leg holding its full weight and the other leg forward. This classic
pose causes the figure's hips and shoulders to rest at opposing angles,
giving a slight s-curve to the entire torso. The contrapposto is
emphasised by the turn of the head to the left, and by the contrasting
positions of the arms.
Michelangelo's David has become one of the most recognized works of Renaissance sculpture, a symbol of strength and youthful beauty.
David's right hand.
Just the colossal size of the statue impressed Michelangelo's contemporaries. Vasari
described it as "certainly a miracle that of Michelangelo, to restore
to life one who was dead," and then listed all of the largest and most
grand of the ancient statues that he had ever seen, concluding that
Michelangelo's work surpassed "all ancient and modern statues, whether
Greek or Latin, that have ever existed."[23]
The proportions of the David are atypical of
Michelangelo's work; the figure has an unusually large head and hands
(particularly apparent in the right hand). The small size of the
genitals, though, is in line with his other works and with Renaissance
conventions in general, perhaps referencing the ancient Greek ideal of
pre-pubescent male nudity. These enlargements may be due to the fact
that the statue was originally intended to be placed on the cathedral
roofline, where the important parts of the sculpture may have been
accentuated in order to be visible from below. The statue is unusually
slender (front to back) in comparison to its height, which may be a
result of the work done on the block before Michelangelo began carving
it.
It is possible that the David was conceived as a political statue before Michelangelo began to work on it.[24]
Certainly David the giant-killer had long been seen as a political
figure in Florence, and images of the Biblical hero already carried
political implications there.[25] Donatello's bronze David, made for the Medici family, perhaps c. 1440, had been appropriated by the Signoria in 1494, when the Medici were exiled from Florence, and the statue was installed in the courtyard of the Palazzo della Signoria,
where it stood for the Republican government of the city. By placing
Michelangelo's statue in the same general location, the Florentine
authorities ensured that David would be seen as a political
parallel as well as an artistic response to that earlier work. These
political overtones led to the statue being attacked twice in its early
days. Protesters pelted it with stones the year it debuted, and, in
1527, an anti-Medici riot resulted in its left arm being broken into
three pieces.
Commentators have noted the presence of foreskin on David's penis, which is at odds with the Judaic practice of circumcision, but is consistent with the conventions of Renaissance art.[26][27]
Conservation
During World War II, David was entombed in brick to protect it from damage from airborne bombs.
Detail
of David's damaged left foot, caused by exposure to the elements and in
1991 when a deranged man hit it with a concealed hammer.
In 1991, the foot of the statue was damaged by a man with a hammer.[13] The samples obtained from that incident allowed scientists to determine that the marble used was obtained from the Fantiscritti quarries in Miseglia, the central of three small valleys in Carrara.
The marble in question contains many microscopic holes that cause it to
deteriorate faster than other marbles. Because of the marble's
degradation, from 2003 to 2004 the statue was given its first major
cleaning since 1843. Some experts opposed the use of water to clean the
statue, fearing further deterioration. Under the direction of Franca
Falleti, senior restorers Monica Eichmann and Cinzia Parnigoni undertook
the job of restoring the statue.[28]
In 2008, plans were proposed to insulate the statue from the
vibration of tourists' footsteps at Florence's Galleria dell'Accademia,
to prevent damage to the marble.[29]
David has stood on display at Florence's Galleria
dell'Accademia since 1873. In addition to the full-sized replica
occupying the spot of the original in front of the Palazzo Vecchio, a bronze version overlooks Florence from the Piazzale Michelangelo. The plaster cast of David at the Victoria and Albert Museum has a detachable plaster fig leaf which is displayed nearby. Legend claims that the fig leaf was created in response to Queen Victoria's
shock upon first viewing the statue's nudity, and was hung on the
figure prior to royal visits, using two strategically placed hooks.[30] David has often been reproduced,[31]
in plaster and imitation marble fibreglass, signifying an attempt to
lend an atmosphere of culture even in some unlikely settings such as
beach resorts, gambling casinos and model railroads.[32]
The
height of the David was recorded incorrectly and the mistake
proliferated through many art history publications. The accurate height
was only determined in 1998–99 when a team from Stanford University went to Florence to try out a project on digitally imaging large 3D
objects by photographing sculptures by Michelangelo and found that the
sculpture was taller than any of the sources had indicated. See [1] and [2].
That "typical examples of kitsch include fridge magnets showing Michelangelo’s David." is reported even in the British Medical Journal (J Launer, "Medical kitsch", BMJ, 2000)
Levine, Saul, "The Location of Michelangelo's David: The Meeting of January 25, 1504", The Art Bulletin, 56 (1974): 31–49.
Natali, Antonio; Michelangelo (2014). Michelangelo Inside and Outside the Uffizi. Florence: Maschietto. ISBN978-88-6394-085-5.
Pope-Hennessy, John, Italian High Renaissance and Baroque Sculpture. London: Phaidon, 1996.
Seymour, Charles, Jr. Michelangelo's David: a search for identity (Mellon Studies in the Humanities), Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1967.
Vasari, Giorgio, The Lives of the Artists (Penguin Books), “Life of Michelangelo”, pp. 325–442.
This theory was first proposed by Saul Levine "The Location of Michelangelo's David: The Meeting of January 25, 1504, The Art Bulletin 56 (1974): 31–49.
The genesis of David was discussed in Seymour 1967 and in Coonin 2014.
Charles Seymour, Jr. "Homo Magnus et Albus: the Quattrocento Background for Michelangelo's David of 1501–04," Stil und Überlieferung in der Kunst des Abendlandes, Berlin, 1967, II, 96–105.
Seymour, 100–101.
Giovanni Gaye, Carteggio inedito d'artisti del sec. XIV, XV, XVI, Florence: 1839–40, 2: 454 and Charles Seymour, Michelangelo's David: A Search for Identity, Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh University Press, 1967, 134–137, doc. 34.
Gaetano Milanesi, Le lettere di Michelangelo Buonarroti pubblicati coi ricordi ed i contratti artistici, Florence, 1875, 620–623: "...the Consuls of the Arte della Lana
and the Lords Overseers being met Overseers, have chosen as sculptor to
the said Cathedral the worthy master, Michelangelo, the son of Lodovico
Buonarrotti, a citizen of Florence, to the end that he may make, finish
and bring to perfection the male figure known as the Giant, nine braccia in height, already blocked out in marble by Maestro Agostino grande,
of Florence, and badly blocked; and now stored in the workshops of the
Cathedral. The work shall be completed within the period and term of two
years next ensuing, beginning from the first day of September next
ensuing, with a salary and payment together in joint assembly within the
hall of the said of six broad florins of gold in gold for every month.
And for all other works that shall be required about the said building
(edificium) the said Overseers bind themselves to supply and provide
both men and scaffolding from their office and all else that may be
necessary. When the said work and the said male figure of marble shall
be finished, then the Consuls and Overseers who shall at that time be in
authority shall judge whether it merits a higher reward, being guided
therein by the dictates of their own consciences."
The
statue has not been weighed, but an estimate of its weight was
circulated in 2004, when the statue was cleaned. See a CBS news report
of 8 March 2004.
The minutes of the meeting were published in Giovanni Gaye, Carteggio inedito d'artisti del sec. XIV, XV, XVI, Florence, 1839–40, 2: 454–463. For an English translation of the document, see Seymour, Michelangelo's David, 140–155 and for an analysis, see Saul Levine, "The Location of Michelangelo's David: The Meeting of January 25, 1504, Art Bulletin 56 (1974): 31–49; N. Randolph Parks, "The Placement of Michelangelo's David: A Review of the Documents," Art Bulletin, 57 (1975) 560–570; and Rona Goffen, Renaissance Rivals: Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian, New Haven, 2002, 123–127.
"a
man the police described as deranged, broke part of a toe with a
hammer, saying a 16th century Venetian painter's model ordered him to do
so." Cowell, Alan. "Michelangelo's David Is Damaged", New York Times, 1991-09-15. Retrieved on 2008-05-23.
Giorgio Vasari, Le vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori nelle redazioni del 1550 e 1568, ed. Rosanna Bettarini and Paola Barocchi, Florence, 1966–87, 6: 21.
Levine, 45–46.
Butterfield, Andrew (1995). "New Evidence for the Iconography of David in Quattrocento Florence". I Tatti Studies. 8: 115–133.
" You need not travel to Florence to see Michelangelo's David.
You can see it well enough for educational purposes in reproduction,"
asserted E. B. Feldman in 1973 (Feldman, "The teacher as model critic", Journal of Aesthetic Education, 1973).
Michelangelo - Brutus 1539 - ... The museum stores however many other treasures: fine works of art enriched by the Carrand, Ressman and Franchetti collections ... Donatello Saint George - 1417. Coming from the Church of Orsanmichele
Nov 15, 2017 - The Bargello should be on any art lover's list of museums to visit in ... Those two rooms (Michelangelo and Donatello) contain most of the really ...
Donatello, the bronze David (1440s?) Museo Nazionale del Bargello h.158 cm
3-D model of the bronze statue (click to rotate)
David is the title of two statues of the biblical hero David by the Italian early Renaissance sculptor Donatello. They consist of an early work in marble of a clothed figure (1408–09), and a far more famous bronze figure that is nude between its helmet and boots, and dates to the 1430s or later. Both are now in the Museo Nazionale del Bargello in Florence.
The story of David and Goliath
comes from 1 Samuel 17. The Israelites are fighting the Philistines,
whose best warrior – Goliath – repeatedly offers to meet the Israelites'
best warrior in man-to-man combat to decide the whole battle. None of
the trained Israelite soldiers is brave enough to fight the giant
Goliath, until David – a shepherd boy who is too young to be a soldier –
accepts the challenge. Saul, the Israelite leader, offers David armor
and weapons, but the boy is untrained and refuses them. Instead, he
goes out with his sling, and confronts the enemy. He hits Goliath in
the head with a stone, knocking the giant down, and then grabs Goliath's
sword and cuts off his head. The Philistines withdraw as agreed and
the Israelites are saved. David's special strength comes from God, and
the story illustrates the triumph of good over evil.[1]
Donatello, then in his early twenties, was commissioned to carve a statue of David in 1408, to top one of the buttresses of Florence Cathedral, though it was never to be placed there. Nanni di Banco was commissioned to carve a marble statue of Isaiah,
at the same scale, in the same year. One of the statues was lifted
into place in 1409, but was found to be too small to be easily visible
from the ground and was taken down; both statues then languished in the
workshop of the opera for several years.[2][3][4] In 1416, the Signoria of Florence commanded that the David be sent to their Palazzo della Signoria;
evidently the young David was seen as an effective political symbol, as
well as a religious hero. Donatello was asked to make some adjustments
to the statue (perhaps to make him look less like a prophet), and a
pedestal with an inscription was made for it: PRO PATRIA FORTITER
DIMICANTIBUS ETIAM ADVERSUS TERRIBILISSIMOS HOSTES DII PRAESTANT
AUXILIUM ("To those who fight bravely for the fatherland the gods lend
aid even against the most terrible foes").[5]
The marble David is Donatello's earliest known important
commission, and it is a work closely tied to tradition, giving few signs
of the innovative approach to representation that the artist would
develop as he matured. Although the positioning of the legs hints at a
classical contrapposto, the figure stands in an elegant Gothic sway that surely derives from Lorenzo Ghiberti.
The face is curiously blank (curiously, that is, if one expects
naturalism, but very typical of the Gothic style), and David seems
almost unaware of the head of his vanquished foe that rests between his
feet. Some scholars have seen an element of personality – a kind of
cockiness -(contrapposto=relaxed stance, shifted weight) suggested by
the twist of the torso and the akimbo placement of the left arm,[6][7]
but overall the effect of the figure is rather bland. However it was
intended to be gilded and painted, set on a pedestal with mosaic,
and also seen from a considerable distance below. Donatello distorted
the proportions of the figure to allow for this angle of view. The head
of Goliath, lying at David's feet, "is carved with great assurance and
reveals the young sculptor’s genuinely Renaissance interest in an
ancient Roman type of mature, bearded head".[8]
The bronze David
Donatello's bronze statue of David (circa 1440s) is famous as the first unsupported standing work of bronze cast during the Renaissance, and the first freestanding nude male sculpture made since antiquity. It depicts David with an enigmatic smile, posed with his foot on Goliath's severed head just after defeating the giant. The youth is completely naked, apart from a laurel-topped hat and boots, bearing the sword of Goliath.
Left side of Donatello's David.
The creation of the work is entirely undocumented, and it has been
given a range of datings. According to one theory, it was commissioned
by the Medici family
in the 1430s to be placed in the centre of the courtyard of the old
Medici Palace. Alternatively it may have been for that position in the
new Palazzo Medici Riccardi,
where it certainly was placed later, which would place the commission
in the mid-1440s or even later. The statue is recorded there by Vasari
and other sources. The Medici family were exiled from Florence in 1494,
and the statue was moved to the courtyard of the Palazzo della Signoria (the marble David was already in the palazzo). It was moved to the Palazzo Pitti in the 17th century, to the Uffizi in 1777, and then finally, in 1865, to the Museo Nazionale del Bargello, where it remains today.[9][10][11][12]
According to Vasari, the statue stood on a column designed by Desiderio da Settignano
in the middle of the courtyard of the Palazzo Medici; an inscription
seems to have explained the statue's significance as a political
monument. Giorgio Vasari, Le Vite..., ed. G. Milanesi, Florence,
1878–1885, III, 108. A quattrocento manuscript containing the text of
the inscription is probably an earlier reference to the statue;
unfortunately the manuscript is not dated. Although a political meaning
for the statue is widely accepted, exactly what that meaning is has been
a matter of considerable debate among scholars.[13]
Most scholars assume the statue was commissioned by Cosimo de' Medici, but the date of its creation is unknown and widely disputed; suggested dates vary from the 1420s to the 1460s (Donatello died in 1466), with the majority opinion recently falling in the 1440s, when the new Medici Palace designed by Michelozzo was under construction.[14] The iconography of the bronze David follows that of the marble David:
a young hero stands with sword in hand, the severed head of his enemy
at his feet. Visually, however, this statue is startlingly different.
David is both physically delicate and remarkably effeminate. The head
has been said to have been inspired by classical sculptures of Antinous,
a favorite of Hadrian renowned for his beauty. The statue's physique
contrasted with the absurdly large sword in hand, shows that David has
overcome Goliath not by physical prowess, but through God.
However, the intention of Donatello is still debated among scholars.
The boy's nakedness further implies the idea of the presence of God,
contrasting the youth with the heavily-armored giant. David is presented uncircumcised, which is generally customary for male nudes in Italian Renaissance art.[15]
There are no indications of contemporary responses to the David.
However, the fact that the statue was not placed in the town hall of
Florence in the 1490s indicates that it was viewed as controversial. In
the early 16th century, the Herald of the Signoria
mentioned the sculpture in a way that suggested there was something
unsettling about it: "The David in the courtyard is not a perfect figure
because its right leg is tasteless."[16] By mid-century Vasari
was describing the statue as so naturalistic that it must have been
made from life. However, among 20th- and 21st-century art historians
there has been considerable controversy about how to interpret it.
The beard on the severed head curls around David's sandaled foot.
Goliath is wearing a winged helmet. David's right foot stands firmly
on the short right wing, while the left wing, considerably longer, works
its way up his right leg to his groin.
The figure has been interpreted in a variety of ways. One has
been to suggest that Donatello was homosexual and that he was expressing
that sexual attitude through this statue.[17][18]
A second is to suggest that the work refers to homosocial values in
Florentine society without expressing Donatello's personal tendencies.[19][20]
However, during the time of the Renaissance, when the statue was
created, sodomy was illegal, and over 14,000 people had been tried in
Florence for this crime.[21] So this homosexual implication was very risky and dangerous. A third interpretation is that David
represents Donatello's effort to create a unique version of the male
nude, to exercise artistic license rather than copy the classical models
that had thus far been the sources for the depiction of the male nude
in Renaissance art.[22]
Change in identification
Detail of the base
The traditional identification of the figure was first questioned in
1939 by Jeno Lanyi, with an interpretation leaning toward ancient
mythology, the hero's helmet especially suggesting Hermes. A number of scholars over the last 70 years have followed Lanyi, sometimes referring to the statue as David-Mercury.[23] If the figure were indeed meant to represent Mercury, it may be supposed that he stands atop the head of the vanquished giant Argus Panoptes. However, this identification is certainly mistaken; all quattrocento references to the statue firmly identify it as David.[24]
Restoration
The
statue underwent restoration from June 2007 to November 2008. This was
the first time the statue had ever been restored, but concerns about
layers of "mineralized waxings" on the surface of the bronze led to the
18-month intervention. The statue was scraped with scalpels (on the
non-gilded areas) and lasered (on the gilded areas) to remove surface
build-up.[25]
"Grove",
Charles Avery and Sarah Blake McHam. "Donatello." Grove Art Online.
Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press, accessed June 16, 2015, subscription required
Documents on the statue may be found in Omaggio a Donatello,
pp. 126–127. On the political implications of David for early-modern
Florence, see Andrew Butterfield, ”New Evidence for the Iconography of
David in Quattrocento Florence,” I Tatti Studies 6 (1995) 114–133.
Randolph, Adrian W.B. (2002) Engaging Symbols: Gender, Politics, and Public Art in Fifteenth-Century Florence, New Haven, pp. 139–141, ISBN0300092121. Randolph published a poem from 1466 that seems to describe the statue in the Medici palace.
Greenhalgh, M. (1982) Donatello and His Sources, London, p. 166.
Steinberg, Leo (1982). "Michelangelo and the Doctors". Bulletin of the History of Medicine. 56: 552–553.
Gaye, G. (1840) Carteggio inedito d'artisti dei secoli xiv.xv.xvi.,
3 vols., Florence, II: 456: "El Davit della corte è una figura et non è
perfecta, perchè la gamba sua di drieto è schiocha." Cited in
Shearman, John (1992) Only Connect...Art and the Spectator in the Italian Renaissance, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 22 n. 17. Shearman notes that schiocha could be translated as "imprudent" or "stupid."
Lanyi never published his hypothesis; his ideas were made public in John Pope-Hennessey (1984) “Donatello’s Bronze David," Scritti di storia dell’arte in onore di Federico Zeri Milan: Electa, pp. 122–127, and further developed in Paroncchi, Alessandro (1980) Donatello e il potere, Florence, pp. 101–115 and Fossi, G. et al. (2000) Italian Art, Florence, p. 91.
Shearman, John (1992) Only Connect...Art and the Spectator in the Italian Renaissance, Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 20–21, ISBN9780691099729.
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