This relief is one of seven panels from a pulpit in the church of San Piero Scheraggio in Florence, which was dismantled sometime between 1410 and 1755. In medieval Italy, pulpits were used for the reading of the Gospels and the Epistles and were located on the south side of the choir. Here, the Virgin and the archangel Gabriel stand in separate niches under a city wall. The fluid treatment of the drapery, the form of the figures, and the combination of narrative reliefs with a background of inlaid serpentine are characteristic of Florentine sculpture around 1200.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Relief with the Annunciation
Date:ca. 1180–1200
Geography:Made in Florence, Central Italy
Culture:Italian
Medium:Carrara marble inlaid with serpentine (verde di Prato)
Dimensions:26 1/2 x 24 x 4 3/4 in. (67.3 x 61 x 12.1 cm)
Classification:Sculpture
Credit Line:The Cloisters Collection, 1960
Object Number:60.140
The panel represents the Annunciation to the Virgin with the angel Gabriel and the Virgin each standing under an arch. The winged Gabriel appears on the left holding a long scepter surmounted by a fleur de lis in his left hand while his right extends toward the Virgin on the right side of the relief. She holds a closed book in her left hand and raises her right hand with the open palm held out in a gesture of surprise. Both figures are nimbed and the space around them is filled with vine scrolls in low relief. The two arches, decorated with egg-and-dart molding, are supported by three twisted columns. The crenelated top of a city wall is represented above the arches. The relief is framed with opus sectile decoration of white quatrefoils against a serpentine ground. The sculpture is in good condition despite some abrasion and small chips throughout and the graffiti beneath the figure of Gabriel. The only significant damage is the roughly triangular loss of the lower right section of marble.
The relief was originally one of seven figural panels on the pulpit of the Florentine Church of San Piero Scheraggio. The church was consecrated in 1068; it was damaged by the construction of the nearby Palazzo Vecchio in 1298, and in 1560, the remaining structure was incorporated into Giorgio Vasari’s Palazzo Uffizi. It was probably during the construction of the Uffizi that the pulpit was dismantled. In 1782 the pulpit was reconstructed outside Florence in the church of San Leonardo in Arcetri without the Annunciation. The other six reliefs represent the Tree of Jesse, the Nativity, the Adoration of the Magi, the Presentation in the Temple, and the Baptism of Christ and the Deposition. The pulpit was reinstalled in San Leonardo Arcetri in 1921 and it remains there today. The New York relief is consistent in dimensions and the style of the faces and drapery with the six panels in Italy. The scene of the Adoration of the Magi is surmounted by a crenellated wall that closely resembles the one in the Annunciation. A slab of marble beneath some of the reliefs in San Leonardo bears fragments of an inscription including the letters "Angel…" Scholars suggest that this might have been part of "ANGEL[US DOMINI…], referring to Gabriel in the museum’s relief.
The style of the carving and the use of serpentine inlay is characteristic of Tuscan sculpture at the end of the twelfth century. The extant pulpit at the Florentine church San Miniato al Monte of about 1180 was likely created by the same workshop. Both the San Miniato pulpit and the reconstructed San Piero Scheraggio pulpit in San Leonardo incorporate marble framing elements richly embellished with an antique vocabulary of moulding decoration such as egg-and-dart, dentils and acanthus leaves. The San Miniato pulpit has no narrative scenes, but nonetheless its form suggests the original appearance of the San Piero example. Furthermore, its location on the south side of the church with the lectern for the Gospel book facing north is typical and likely mirrors the original position of the San Piero Scheraggio pulpit.
Selected reference:
Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Lisbeth, and Jack Soultanian. Italian Medieval Sculpture in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Cloisters. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2010. no. 19, pp. 82–86.
Entry by Peter Barnet, curator emeritus, Department of Medieval Art and The Met Cloisters
[2020; adapted from draft Barnet Sculpture Catalogue]
Marking: On lower left border: FRANCIS
From the church of San Piero Scheraggio, Florence; Baron Joseph van der Elst, Belgian ambassador to Italy (1896–1971) ; [ F. Kleinberger Galleries Galleries, New York (sold 1960)]
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Year 1200: A Centennial Exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art," February 12–May 10, 1970.
Musée des Augustins. "Exhibition," April 13–June 30, 1970.
Hoving, Thomas. "A Long-Lost Romanesque Annunciation." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 20, no. 4 (December 1961). Frontispiece, p. 123, fig. 7.
"'Additions to the Collections,' Ninety-First Annual Report of the Trustees for the Fiscal Year 1960-1961." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 20, no. 2 (October 1961). p. 68.
Rorimer, James J. The Cloisters: The Building and the Collection of Medieval Art in Fort Tryon Park. 3rd revised ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1963. pp. 49–50.
Wildenstein and Co., Inc. and Olga Raggio. "An Exhibition of Works of Art Lent from American Collections for the Benefit of the Committee to Rescue Italian Art, May 17–August 29, 1967." In The Italian Heritage. Providence, Rhode Island, 1967. no. 10.
Hoffmann, Konrad, ed. The Year 1200: A Centennial Exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 1. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1970. no. 45, pp. 37–38.
Collins, Fletcher. The Production of Medieval Church Music-Drama. Charlottesville: University of Virginia, 1972. p. 68.
Deuchler, Florens. "The Cloisters: Ein Museum für mittelalterliche Kunst in New York." Du 32, no. 2 (1972). p. 106.
Rorimer, James J. Medieval Monuments at The Cloisters: As They Were and As They Are, edited by Katherine Serrell Rorimer. Revised ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1972. pp. 56–59, fig. 71–75.
Hibbard, Howard. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: Harper & Row, 1980. p. 164, fig. 295.
Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Lisbeth. "Romanesque Sculpture in North American Collections. XXII. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Part II: Italy." Gesta 24, no. 1 (1985). no. 6, pp. 69–70, fig. 7.
Wixom, William D. "Medieval Sculpture at The Cloisters." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 46, no. 3 (Winter 1988-1989). p. 47.
Botteri Landucci, Laura, and Gilberto Dorini. La chiesa di San Leonardo in Arcetri. Florence: Becocci Editore, 1996. p. 16.
Hoving, Thomas. False Impressions: the Hunt for Big-Time Art Fakes. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996. pp. 120–22.
Tigler, Guido. "Proposta di restituzione ed interpretazione del pergamo di San Leonardo in Arcetri." Antichità Viva 36 (September-December 1997). pp. 2–21. 27–28, fig. 11.
Poeschke, Joachim. Die Skulptur des Mittelalters in Italien. Vol. 1. Munich: Hirmer Verlag, 1998. p. 158.
Milone, Antonio. "Pergami medievali in età moderna: Alcuni casi di ricomposizione e riuso." In Pulpiti medievali toscani: Storia e restauri di micro-architetture; atti della giornata di studio, Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, Firenze, 21 giugno 1996, edited by Daniela Lamberini. Studi (Accademia Toscana di Scienze e Lettere la Colombaria), Vol. 173. Florence: Olschki, 1999. pp. 67–68.
Milone, Antonio, and Guido Tigler. "Catalogo dei pulpiti romanici toscani." In Pulpiti medievali toscani: Storia e restauri di micro-architetture; atti della giornata di studio, Accademia delle arti del disegno, Firenze, 21 giugno 1996, edited by Daniela Lamberini. Studi (Accademia Toscana di Scienze e Lettere la Colombaria), Vol. 173. Florence: Olschki, 1999. no. 42, pp. 166, 175, 180.
Melcher, Ralph. Die mittelalterlichen Kanzeln der Toskana. Manuskripte zur Kunstwissenschaft in der Wernerschen Verlagsgesellschaft, Vol. 56. Worms: Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, 2000. pp. 271, 427.
Glass, Dorothy. "Review of Die Skulptur des Mittelalters in Italien, vol. 1, Romanik." Kunstchronik 54, no. 6 (June 2001). p. 251.
Glass, Dorothy. "Review of Italian Gothic Sculpture, c. 1250-c. 1400, by Anita Fiderer Moskowitz, and Die Skulptur des Mittelalters in Italien, vol. 2, Gotik, by Joachim Poeschke." Journal für Kunstgeschichte 5, no. 4 (2001). p. 309, n. 22.
Barnet, Peter, and Nancy Y. Wu. The Cloisters: Medieval Art and Architecture. New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2005. no. 34, pp. 66, 195.
Moskowitz, Anita F. Nicola and Giovanni Pisano: the Pulpits; Pious Devotion, Pious Diversion. London: Harvey Miller Publishers, 2005. p. 47.
Milone, Antonio, and Roberto Paolo Novello. "Il corpus italico degli amboni medievali." In L'Ambone: Tavola della parola di giugno 2005, edited by Goffredo Boselli. Liturgia e Vita. Bose Magnano: Edizioni Qiqajon, 2006. p. 115.
Hoving, Thomas. "Collecting Mania." In Artful Tom: A Memoir. http://www.artnet.com: artnet, May 29, 2009.
Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Lisbeth, and Jack Soultanian. Italian Medieval Sculpture in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Cloisters. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2010. no. 19, pp. 82–86.
Barnet, Peter, and Nancy Y. Wu. The Cloisters: Medieval Art and Architecture. 75th Anniversary ed. New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012. p. 64.
Couzin, Robert. Right and Left in Early Christian and Medieval Art. Boston: Brill, 2021. p.196, fig. 59.
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