Donatello, real name Donato di Niccolo c.1386-1466
Florentine sculptor

Donatello was one of the most important artists of early Renaissance Italy. He trained in the Florence Cathedral workshop under Ghiberti and received his first commission in 1408. He was the first sculptor since classical times to produce works which are fully rounded and independent in themselves and not mere adjuncts of their architectural settings. The evolution of his highly-charged and emotional style can be traced in a series of figures of saints he executed for the exterior of Or San Michele and another series of prophets for the Campanile, in which his interest in classical antiquity is evident.

In the 1420s, in partnership with Michelozzi, he produced the monument to the antipope John XXIII in the Baptistery which influenced all subsequent tomb design. In 1443 he migrated to Padua where he produced the bronze equestrian portrait of the military commander known as Gattemelata - the first lifesize equestrian statue since antiquity. The celebrated bronze statue of David is a key work of the Renaissance, as is the multiple-viewpoint Judith and Holofernes in the Piazza della Signoria in Florence. The anguished, expressive statue of Mary Magdalene has no counterpart elsewhere in the 15th century and not until Michelangelo was Donatello's expressive power equalled.

Bibliography: C Avery, Donatello: An Introduction (1994); Bonnie A Bennett and David G Wilkins, Donatello (1984); H Janson, The Sculpture of Donatello (1957).