Madonna and Child with Angels

Abstract

Andrea della Robbia was paid twenty gold florins (about the cost of 7000 eggs at the time) to make this glazed terracotta lunette that was finished in 1489. It was made for the Residenza dell'Opera in the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. The della Robbia family workshop -- the so-called inventors of glazed terracotta -- made several lunettes of the Madonna and Child with angels, as depicted here, or with saints to surmount the exterior doors of churches. Andrea experimented sometimes with a broad colour palette, but here he used the signature blue and white colour scheme devised by the workshop's founder, his uncle Luca della Robbia. The majority of sculptures made by the della Robbia workshop remain in excellent condition, but there appears to be damage to the blue glaze in this relief. Today, the sculpture is displayed in the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo. Photograph(s) licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.