Bruges Madonna
The Bruges Madonna is a sculpture by Michelangelo from 1501 to 1506 in the Moscron Chapel of the Bruges Church of Our Lady .
description
The Bruges Madonna is unsigned, has a base 1.26 m high and is made of polished marble . It is a full sculpture, designed for viewing and admiration from the front. The depiction shows Mary with the standing Jesus boy . Both have drooped eyelids, which Leonardo da Vinci introduced in his depictions of Mary. This introversion is an expression of their awareness of future events.
The statue is not a standing figure of Mary with the little baby Jesus on her arm, but a seated one with a boy already standing between her knees, whose right hand she grabs with her left. Her right hand is holding a book on her knee. This unique motif is evidently based on the Platytera type of Mary. Maria's dress is closed with a decorative plate trim in the chest area, from which two ribbons fall down. Michelangelo drapes an omega fold in the middle over Mary's forehead . In the case of the Madonna, her hair, the headscarf adorned with the omega fold and her cloak are arranged over her head.
The work of art stands in a black marble cone , the upper end of which is adorned with the dome , a large shell motif, as a sign of fertility and at the same time the virginity of Mary.
Attribution and history
The attribution was made in the 19th century based on Michelangelo's letter of January 31, 1506 to his father Lodovico di Leonardo Buonarroti Simoni in Florence, in which he mentioned this work of art. He asked the Father to “take care of that marble Madonna because I want her to be carried into your house and not shown to anyone”. The existence of the sculpture had to remain hidden, as it was part of a contract between Michelangelo and Francesco Todeschini Piccolomini, who later became Pope Pius III. was. He intended to have an altar set up for himself and his family in the north aisle of the Cathedral of Siena . First, Pietro Torrigiano , who smashed Michelangelo's nose in the Scuola di San Marco, was appointed as the artist. However, after starting the statue of St. Francis for the altar, Torrigiano joined Cesare Borgia's army as a soldier .
For Michelangelo, the possibility of obtaining late satisfaction was likely to have been decisive when he was asked to continue the contract. Fifteen statues were to be delivered, the two braccia (cubits), i.e. approx. 120 cm high. If the quality was not satisfactory, Michelangelo would have had to improve or replace it. Michelangelo was not allowed to accept any further orders within the contractual period of three years. However, he did not keep the contract; after this period he was unable to present a single statue to Piccolomini, who had already been promoted to pope. The heirs sent Michelangelo a dunning letter offering to extend the contract by two years. Under this impression, Michelangelo delivered five sculptures in October 1504 (Peter, Paul, Gregory, Pius, Francis). In 1508 Michelangelo stepped out of the contract, he had taken on his job.
It is believed that the Bruges Madonna was originally intended for this commission. How the Madonna was sold in Brussels remains unclear. It is believed that Michelangelo did not want to put his significant work in a “niche” or that he sold the work at a price advantage of 33½ ducats. On April 21, 1564, shortly after the artist's death, Michelangelo's nephew Leonardo repaid 100 ducats to the Piccolomini heirs.
The statue was purchased by Johann and Alexandre Mouscron, merchants from Bruges, because it corresponded to their ideas about an altar foundation they had planned. In August 1505 the statue was completed and received its final polish. Another year passed before it was shipped. Nevertheless she arrived safely in Bruges. There it stayed with the Mouscron family until Alexandre Mouscron donated it to the Notre Dame Church in Bruges in 1514 . On April 7, 1521, Albrecht Dürer saw her there, who called her the “ Alabaster image of Mary ”.
In contrast to the Roman Pietà , Michelangelo did not sign his work. However, its authorship is usually not disputed. An indication of the general assignment as his work is that there is evidence that the statue was transported via Viareggio to Bruges and purchased by the Mouscron. The work represents the ideals of the High Renaissance in Florence . On the basis of a sketch that has been preserved, it is assumed that a man was the model for the figure of the Madonna.
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During the French Revolution , the statue was in Paris , from 1815 it was again in the Church of Our Lady in Bruges. In 1944 it was confiscated by the German occupation forces and stored in a disused mine in Altaussee , from where it was later to be brought to the Führer Museum planned in Linz together with other Nazi-looted art . After the war ended in 1945, she was able to return to the old square.
Trivia
The Bruges Madonna is a central theme of the film Monuments Men - Unusual Heroes (2014). In addition to the paths of other looted art, the search for it and its recovery in Altaussee after the fall of the Nazi regime in 1945 is shown.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Madonna of Bruges
- ^ Hannelise Hinderberger: Michelangelo. Life stories. Poems. Letters. Manesse Zurich, 1947. pp. 110, 499.
- ↑ Franz-Joachim Verspohl: Michelangelo Buonarrotti and Leonardo da Vinci, Republican Everyday Life and Artists' Competition in Florence between 1501 and 1505. Berlin 2007, ISBN 3-8353-0216-7 , pp. 93–96.
- ↑ Bruges Madonna ( Memento of the original dated November 10, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ The world
Web links
literature
- Sebastian Halle: The Piccolomini Altar and the Bruges Madonna - The Piccolomini Madonna ?: On the current state of research. Grin 2011, ISBN 3-656-06687-6 .