David
David, marble sculpture executed from 1501 to 1504 by the Italian Renaissance artist Michelangelo depicting the biblical hero in the tense moments before he confronts the Philistine giant Goliath. Rather than showing David after his victory, as earlier artists often had, Michelangelo presents him poised for action, alert and intensely focused. Celebrated for its anatomical precision, psychological intensity, and commanding scale, the sculpture became an emblem of Renaissance ideals of human strength and beauty as well as a powerful civic symbol of Florence.
The David was commissioned by the Opera del Duomoāthe committee of officials in charge of the decoration and maintenance of the Florence Cathedralāas part of a long-running project to decorate the roofline around the dome with statues of biblical prophets and mythological figures. Two had been put into place during the previous century: terra-cotta figures depicting Joshua and Hercules by Donatello and his former student Agostino di Duccio, respectively. Agostino had also been commissioned to make a statue of David in 1464, but he abandoned the project after doing only a little work. Another sculptor, Antonio Rossellino, was hired to take over the project in 1476, but he backed out almost immediately, citing the poor quality of the marble. Left without a sculptor but too expensive to throw away, the massive slab sat out in the elements for a quarter century.
When the project was revived in 1501, Michelangelo, whose fame was rising with the completion of the PietĆ , was given a two-year contract to sculpt the David. Running slightly behind schedule, he nonetheless demonstrated his technical virtuosity by extracting a figure nearly 17 feet (5.17 meters) tall from the spoiled block. To accommodate the enormity of the statue, Michelangelo organized the body into relatively clear, large forms rather than relying on tiny, delicate details. The youthful David stands nude just after having taken off his armor to go into battle. He turns his head to the left and narrows his eyes toward the unseen Goliath. He holds the sling tossed over his left shoulder and the stone concealed in his right hand. The balance of the figure is subtly arranged to keep the bearing leg under the head while permitting the apparently nonbearing leg to be relaxed. The positions are reversed in the arms, giving the cross-axis balance of working and relaxed members. Indeed, the sculptureās psychological intensity arises in part from its formal balance of tension and restraint: The shifted weight, opposing positions of the arms and legs, turned head, and concentrated gaze suggest a body held in readiness for action. With its idealized nude form, carefully balanced pose, and close attention to anatomy, the figure also reflects the Renaissance revival of classical artistic ideals together with the periodās growing emphasis on naturalism.
" height="20" alt="HEW Logo">
After Michelangelo completed the sculpture, the magnificence of the finished work persuaded his contemporaries to install it in a more visible place, to be determined by a commission composed of artists and prominent citizens. They decided that the David would be installed in front of the entrance of the Palazzo della Signoria (now the Palazzo Vecchio), the town hall, as a symbol of the Florentine republic, transforming the sculptureās original religious role into a political one. The biblical heroās courage and readiness for conflict could be understood as qualities the republic wished to claim for itself. The original sculpture was moved indoors to the Galleria dellāAccademia in 1873, and copies were later installed in the Piazza della Signoria and the Piazzale Michelangelo, which overlooks Florence.