The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (142 page)

 
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(1386?–1466).
Florentine sculptor. He was the greatest European sculptor of the 15th cent. and one of a remarkable group of artists—including his friends
Alberti
,
Brunelleschi
, and
Masaccio
—who created the
Renaissance
style in Florence. Between 1404 and 1407 he was working as an assistant to
Ghiberti
, but he developed a style that was radically different to his master's
Gothic
elegance. He was unconcerned with the surface polish or linear grace so typical of Ghiberti, and excelled rather in emotional force. His revolutionary conception of sculpture is exemplified in the great series of standing figures in niches which he made for Or San Michele and Florence Cathedral. The series began with the
St Mark
of 1411–13 (Or San Michele), included the celebrated
St George
(
c.
1415–17), now in the Bargello, Florence, and culminated in the so-called
Zuccone
(‘bald-pate’) in the Cathedral Museum (probably completed in 1436, although because various figures of prophets, of which this is one, are not identified unambiguously in the documents, some authorities think it was carved in 1423–5).
Vasari
conveys the brilliance of Donatello's characterization in his description of the
St George
: ‘The head exhibits the beauty of youth, its spirit and valour in arms, a proud and terrifying life-likeness, and a marvellous sense of movement within the stone.’ With this acute psychological insight went a technique of daring originality that shows how concerned Donatello was with the optical effects of his works. He carefully took into consideration the position from which they would be viewed, adjusting the proportions of a figure when it would be seen from below, for example, and carving with almost brutal power and boldness when it was positioned to be seen at a distance. On the other hand, his relief of
St George and the Dragon
(Or San Michele, 1417), done for the base of his
St George
statue, is executed with great delicacy in the technique Donatello invented called
rilievo schiacciato
(
relief
so low it is like ‘drawing in stone’); situated on the north side of the building, the relief is seen in a soft, diffused light, so the subtlety of the carving can be appreciated.
In 1430–2 Donatello visited Rome, probably with Brunelleschi , and the impact of
antique
art can be seen most clearly in his famous
Cantoria
(singing gallery) for Florence Cathedral (now Cathedral Mus., 1433–9), which makes a lavish show of freely interpreted classical motifs. The bronze statue of David (Bargello), which is credited with being the first free-standing nude statue since antiquity, is also sometimes seen as a response to Donatello's visit to Rome and assigned to the 1430s, but some scholars date it much later. The subject as well as the date is controversial, for it has been proposed that it represents
Mercury with the Head of Argus
rather than David . From 1443 to 1453 Donatello was based in Padua, his reason for moving there presumably being the commission to execute the Gattamelata monument in the Piazza del Santo—the first life-size equestrian statue since antiquity. His other major work in Padua was the High Altar of the church of S. Antonio (the Santo), which features free-standing figures and reliefs that are not now in their original positions.
From 1454 until his death Donatello was based mainly in Florence, although he also worked in Siena on an abortive project for a set of bronze doors for the Cathedral. In his late work he gave more prominence to the emotional intensity that was already such a feature of his style. The most important works from his final years are
Judith and Holofernes
in the Piazza della Signoria, a harrowing and emaciated
Mary Magdalene
in wood (Baptistry), and two pulpits with bronze reliefs in S. Lorenzo, which were unfinished at his death. These sublime late works show how freely Donatello exploited the expressive possibilities of distortion, and in them he created what has been called ‘the first style of old age in the history of art’. His work had enormous influence, on painters as well as sculptors, and his true spiritual heir was
Michelangelo
.

 
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(1877–1968).
Dutch-born painter who settled in Paris in 1897 and took French nationality in 1929. His early work was
Impressionist
, but he became a member of the
Fauvist
group in 1906 and in 1908 exhibited with the German
Expressionist
group Die
Brücke
. Nudes and female portraits were his favourite themes. After the First World war he became well known for his paintings of insolently glamorous women, in which he created a type that has been described as ‘half drawing-room prostitute, half sidewalk princess’. He kept the brilliant colouring of his Fauve days, but his great facility led to repetition and banality and it is generally agreed that his best work was done before 1920. From 1959 he lived in Monaco.

 
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Donkey's Tail
.

Title of an exhibition organized in Moscow in 1912 by
Larionov
and
Goncharova
after they had dissociated themselves from the
Knave of Diamonds
group in 1911. They accused that group of being too much under foreign influence, and advocated a nationalist Russian art. At this time Larionov and Goncharova were painting in their ‘primitivist’ manner based upon Russian peasant art and
icon
painting.
Malevich
and
Tatlin
also showed at the exhibition, which took its name from Larionov's having heard that a group of artists in Paris had exhibited a picture that a donkey had ‘painted’ by means of a brush tied to its tail. The exhibition caused an outcry because it was thought to be irreverent to show religious works under such a frivolous title (the police ordered several to be removed). It was followed by the
Target exhibition
in 1913.

 
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