Modello
A modello [moˈdɛllo] (plural modelli), from Italian,[1] is a preparatory study or model, usually at a smaller scale, for a work of art or architecture, especially one produced for the approval of the commissioning patron.[2] The term gained currency in art circles in Tuscany in the fourteenth century.[3] Modern definitions in reference works vary somewhat. Alternative and overlapping terms are "oil sketch" (schizzo) and "cartoon" for paintings, tapestry, or stained glass, maquette, plastico or bozzetto[4] for sculpture or architecture, or architectural model.[5]
Background
Though in Gothic figural arts bishops and abbots are often represented carrying small simulacra[6] of buildings they had constructed – "models" in the familiar modern sense – modello is only used of pieces which pre-date the finished work, and were at least in part produced by the main artist involved.[7] The less frequently found term ricordo (Italian for "record" or "memory") means a similar piece produced as a small copy after completion of the work as a record for the workshop.[8] Naturally it is not always easy for art historians to decide whether a particular piece is one or the other, and, especially in the Late Renaissance and Baroque periods, when several versions of a painting were made, the ricordo for the prime version might serve in the atelier as the modello for the subsequent ones.[9] No doubt a modello was often modified after the main work was completed to reflect any changes in the composition during painting, thus making it a ricordo also; this would normally be impossible for art historians to distinguish from a modello altered during its original production.
The
"Cartoon", named for the sturdy cartone paper on which they were generally executed, is usually used of working drawings, often at full scale, The French version of the word, modèle, may be used of French works, and is normally italicised.
Especially in the case of oil sketches, many modelli are greatly valued in their own right, as they may show a freedom in execution and freshness of inspiration missing in the final work, and also may show changes in composition from the finished work, throwing light on the process of artistic creation. Earlier stages of the creative process may be recorded in "preparatory drawings" or "studies", either for the whole composition, or a part of it, such as a single figure.
Examples
An example of a modello of a fresco cycle, which was rescued for its intrinsic value is in
Many modelli show versions of works which were never actually realised, or have been lost. Famous examples are the alternative designs produced for the competition in 1401 to design the North doors of the
There are alternative, unrealised, modelli for many famous buildings, including
See also
References
- ^ The term modello avoids the ambiguity in English of model, which may equally refer to the finished work of art that provided detailed inspiration for a variant or later copy.
- ISBN 0-313-24658-0.
- Carmen Bambach Cappel, "A Note on the Word Modello', The Art Bulletin 74.1 (March 1992:172–173) are all Tuscan, as Hirst remarks, though the contemporaneous term extended as far as the Marche.
- ^ A bozzetto is a roughly-modelled preliminary sketch in clay for a sculpture; those that survive have mostly been kiln-fired to preserve them.
- ^ Fourteenth century uses of modello in connection with Santa Reparata, Florence, are noted in A. Grote, Studien zur Geschichte der Opera Santa Reparata zu Florenz in Vierzehnten Jahrhundert (Munich 1960:113ff).
- ^ The Latin term modulus, a synonym of typus, "archetype" is given as source for the usage in the Tusacan Accademia della Crusca's early dictionaries; other early dictionary definitions in Italian are noted by Carmen Bambach Cappel 1992:173. See also Donor portrait
- ISBN 0-521-34016-0; the correspondence concerning the appropriateness or not of modello applied by Michael Hirst to presentation drawings by Michelangelothat were "done expressly for patronal approval, criticism or rejection" (Hirst, Michelangelo and His Drawings, 1988:79) is noted above.
- ^ A small finished bronze representing a completed sculpture on a reduced scale, made for a connoisseur or the art market, is a reduction.
- was produced as a ricordo for the first version of a work, and then used as the modello for a second version.
- ^ Compare with Brunelleschi's unsuccessful version. Both are in the Bargello
- ISBN 0-901791-09-1
- – note this is reversed compared to the final painting.
- ^ Francisco Bayeu. Saragossa; Review of Exhibition by Xavier Bray, The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 138, No. 1120 (Jul., 1996), p. 479, note 3. JSTOR – on free page
- ^ National Gallery, London
- ^ Cartoons for tapestry were always at full scale; often cut into loom-width strips, they were set behind the warps of the loom as a direct guide for the weavers. The most famous tapestry cartoons are the "Raphael Cartoons" conserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum, for the Sistine Chapel tapestries; they were re-used in the 17th century in England to produce sets of Mortlake tapestries.
- OEDor the First Supplement of 1933
- ^ "A most beautiful modello of all the works, which is today in our houses in Arezzo."
- ^ In vol. II, section "Breve instruttione per dipingere a fresco", noted by Carmen Bambach Cappel, loc. cit..
- ^ Explore St Paul's – Wren's Great Model