Donatello, David

We're in a fortress, what is now the Bargello, a museum in the city of Florence. We've walked up a set of stairs in the courtyard and entered into a magnificent high-ceilinged room that holds the great collection of Donatello's sculpture. But let's focus on one of the smaller sculptures in the room, a bronze. This is Donatello's David. This figure is the first life-size, freestanding nude sculpture since classical antiquity. That is, since the time of ancient Greece and Rome. And so we have, in a way, the very definition of the Renaissance here, the idea of looking back to ancient Greek and Roman culture to renew the art and culture of the 15th century in Italy. And it does it also through its material. This is a large-scale bronze, a material that was used by the ancient Greeks and the ancient Romans. And so we see this reference to antiquity through its materiality, through its subject, and certainly through the forms of the body. So this is an expensive commission, and we believe that the patron was a member of the very wealthy Medici family in Florence who were the de facto rulers of the city, although Florence still held to its Republican ideals. At its most basic level, the sculpture is a representation of the biblical story of the young shepherd boy, David, who overcomes Goliath, this giant, by putting a rock in his slingshot, hitting him between the eyes, felling him, and cutting his head off with a sword. But there are many other layers of meaning here that are much more specific to 15th century Florence. David was understood to be victorious, not because he was a good aim, not because he was stronger than Goliath, but because God intervened on his behalf. And the Florentines similarly believed that God had intervened on their behalf. In a fairly recent victory over the much larger army of the Duke of Milan, they were victorious, and they believed their victory was a result of God's will. And so David becomes this perfect symbol of the modern city of Florence. I wanna talk about the fact of his being freestanding, that is, that we can walk around him, we can see him from all points of view. He wasn't meant to be within an architectural niche, and there's a kind of freedom and autonomy to the human figure. Importantly, Donatello is rediscovering contrapposto, the standing position used in ancient Greek and Roman sculpture, where the figure places his weight on one leg, bends his other leg, and tilts at the hips, tilts at the shoulders, and as a result has a freedom of mobility, a figure who can move into our space. This representation of David is not muscular. The limbs are thin, and that underscores the youth of this figure, a boy who is still an adolescent. In the Bible, David refuses to put on armor when it's offered to him, but there's no mention of the fact that he goes to battle against Goliath, completely nude. This is Donatello's choice here, one, because it looks back to the nudity of ancient Greek and Roman figures, but also because it emphasizes his youthfulness, and therefore, God's role in this victory. If we look closely at Goliath's head and the helmet that he wears, we can see it has a kind of wing attached to it that rises up the inside of David's thigh, and so there is this dimension of sensuality and eroticism here, no doubt. There's also an image of Eros riding a chariot depicted on Goliath's helmet. Look at Goliath's face. It's gnarled, it's rough, and it's in such contrast to the youthfulness and beauty of David's face, but David doesn't even seem to acknowledge Goliath. He looks down. It is a contemplative moment. David is not rejoicing in his victory. He seems to be coming to terms with what God has just done for the Israelites, and then there's the contrast also of David's soft shepherd's hat with a wreath around it, a reference to victory, against the helmet of war that is worn by Goliath, and so you have this idea of David as inherently peaceful and Goliath as inherently violent. That is to say, Florence as inherently peaceful, whereas its enemies are inherently militaristic. So let's go back to that idea of David as a symbol of the Florentine Republic. We know that by the 1460s, this sculpture was seen in the courtyard of the brand-new Medici Palace in the center of Florence. It stood on a rather high pedestal. We would have looked up at him, and he would have recalled the idea of a classical sculpture atop a column. For this symbol of the Republic of Florence, of its freedoms, its liberty, to be within this private space of the Medici courtyard meant that the Medici were, in a way, associating themselves with the Florentine Republic, even though they were essentially the rulers of Florence, pretending that the Republic still existed. That point is made even more clear because an earlier sculpture by Donatello of David, but this time in marble, had been in the city hall of Florence for all to see in this public space, whereas the bronze statue was visible to the public only from the street, except for those who were invited into the more private spaces of the Medici. And so there is this real contrast between these two Davids, one that had been commissioned by the Medici and one that was a public sculpture. Not only commissioned by the Medici, but displayed within their private palace. And not long after the sculpture was made, the Medici were exiled. They were run out of town. This sculpture was taken into the city hall as well. It was made a public sculpture, but then the Medici came back. And at that point, they threw off the pretense that Florence was a republic and they became the rulers. I think that one of the things that David does is it reminds us of the tremendous civic pride felt by the people of Florence for their republic, for their freedoms. Let's spend just a moment talking about how this was made. This sculpture uses a number of different techniques. Lost wax casting to create its basic forms, but then the sculpture is smoothed, it's filed, it's polished. And then the artist and his workshop would have begun to chisel into the surface of the bronze, a process that is known as chasing. And you can see that especially in the cuts within the hair. And then there were parts of the sculpture that were gilded, and you can still see some remnants of the gold leaf in the hair itself. And so this is a very labor-intensive process. And Donatello is showing an extraordinary degree of skill in this rediscovery of large-scale bronze. And the rediscovery of so many other things from the classical world. This classicism is rooted in the city's very identity. Florence believed that it had a Roman origin. And so Donatello's David tells this extraordinary story about the Renaissance reverence for classical Greek and Roman culture, but also of its understanding of its own place in history.