A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture

by Clara Erskine Clement Waters

Fig. 87.—Boy with Dolphin.
By Verocchio.

The Robbia family was followed by other workers in glazed ware, and during about a century it was a prominent feature in art, and then was gradually given up.

The most noted pupil of Donatello was Andrea del Verocchio (1432-1488). He was born at Florence, and was early apprenticed to a goldsmith called Verocchio, from whom the sculptor took his surname. It is said that this name came from the fact that the elder Verocchio had remarkable exactness of sight.

Neither the metal works nor the paintings which Verocchio did remain, and after about 1466 he devoted himself entirely to sculpture. It is difficult to associate him with Donatello; his execution is finished like most sculptors who were also metal-workers; his nude parts are true to nature, but not graceful or attractive, and his draperies are in small folds, which give a tumbled, crumpled effect rather than that of the easy, graceful falling of soft material.

His best works are a David in the Museum of the Bargello, Florence; a bronze Genius pressing a Dolphin to itself on a fountain in the court of the Palazzo Vecchio (Fig. 87); an equestrian statue of Colleoni before the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo, Venice (Fig. 88); and a group of St. Thomas examining the Wounds of Christ at the Church of Or San Michele, Florence. This last work is in his best and latest manner; the expression is powerful, but the drapery is still very faulty.

Although this equestrian statue is called by Verocchio's name, he did not live to see it completed; and though it was without doubt made from his design, still some credit for its execution is due to Alessandro Leopardo, who finished it. When Colleoni died he left all his large fortune to the Republic of Venice on condition that they should erect an equestrian monument to him in the square of St. Mark. As it was forbidden by the laws of Venice to place such things in the Piazza of St. Mark, it was placed in its present position, before the Church of San Giovanni e Paolo, on the square of the School of St. Mark, and it was thought that this answered the requirements of the will.

Fig. 88.—Statue of Colleoni.
By Verocchio.

When Verocchio had gone to Venice and had modelled the horse, he was told that the Signory intended to have the rider made by another sculptor. He felt this to be an insult, and broke off the head and legs of the horse, and left Venice for Florence. The Signory issued a decree forbidding him to set foot again on Venetian soil under pain of death. The sculptor replied that he should not take the risk, as he well knew that the Signory could take off his head, and he could not put it on, while he could replace his horse's head with a better one. The Venetians knew that this was true, and repealed their decree, and doubling his pay, asked him to come to complete his work. Verocchio consented to do so, but had not been long in Venice when he died. Verocchio is said to have spent much time in drawing from the antique, and his works prove him to have been diligent and painstaking; these qualities made him the sculptor that he was; but we see no traces in his work of the heaven-born genius which makes the artist great, and so inspires himself that his works fill all beholders with an enthusiasm in a degree akin to his own; the works of such artists as Verocchio, who have only the excellencies which come from patient industry, interest us, but they cannot move our hearts.