However, since these two works ‘are believed to be the earliest surviving painted examples of the form’, there is no model on which to base reframings, save for something like The Berlin Tondo mentioned by Alessandro Cecchi (and illustrated above), which is a desco da parto rather than a wall-mounted painting, now dated to c.1427-28 and just over half the size of the Veneziano. He was a busy chap, and in any case Florentine Renaissance woodworkers were of similar status to artists, and  would have undertaken the whole of a project, from design to completion (artists might sometimes produce the drawing for a major altarpiece or polyptych, but this was a collaborative, rather than a commanding act) [53]. For example, the chambers of several early 16th century households featured tondi set in elaborate frames with candleholders. 393-96, reveals the payment record which caused Milanesi to mention the tondo painted for the Udienza in 1487, and which she eventually found in the Archivio di Stato di Firenze. The difference in medium of the (mainly gilded) stucco roundel from the painted panels enhances the sense of a celestial vison hovering above the heads of the Franciscans, and providing a sort of launching pad for the risen Christ in the apex. high, and details of Madonna and heraldic tondi, Santa Croce, Florence. Donatello (1386-1466), Madonna & Child with two angels, c.1445, gilded bronze, 27 cm. monsters. The painting is still in its original frame, one that Michelangelo might have influenced or helped design. The stucco scenes and Evangelists inserted into Brunelleschi’s spare roundels by Donatello had a later outcome in the four fully-coloured tondi of the Evangelists (designer/maker disputed) and twelve blue-&-white Apostles, made in glazed terracotta by Luca and/or Andrea della Robbia from c. 1445 -70, for the empty frames in the Pazzi Chapel – another design by Brunelleschi which was updated near to and following his death. We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us. III, note 73, p. 43, by M. Sframelli et L. Pagnotta, [5] For the place of this piece in the Medici commissions, see Alessandro Cecchi, ‘La committenza delle grandi famiglie nella Firenza del Quattrocento’, in AA.VV. Signorelli's Madonna similarly uses a tondo form, depicts nude male figures in the background, and displays the Virgin sitting directly on the earth. ; Alessandro Cecchi, ‘Il tondo Doni agli Uffizi’, ibid., pp. This occulus-like depiction of the Madonna can be seen again in the funerary monument of Leonardo Bruni, where it is echoed by another tondo on the top of the frame: a much more worldly version, with a tightly-packed torus of bay leaves and berries bound with ribbon, which forms a garland frame for the family coat of arms. It is a shallow-relief carving in which the figures are set forward of the ‘frame’, which is decorated below the top fillet with a band of stylized palm leaves (for martyrdom) interspersed with roses (for the Virgin), with an architectural moulding inside this, at what would normally be the sight edge. The nude youths in the background of the painting are supposed to represent these resurrected children, and are linked to the group in the foreground by the figure of John the Baptist, who represents the saving sacrament of baptism [58]. Michelangelo’s alleged part in designing the frame for the tondo cannot be taken for granted; it rests to some extent on drawings such as this, which depict small elements with intertwining zoömorphic forms and foliage, like the carved and undercut ornament of the frame, and like the evidently similar decoration of the cassoni and spalliere in the house. Donatello’s stucchi in Brunelleschi’s roundels: from left, St Luke; St John on Patmos; St John, Old Sacristy, San Lorenzo. The head of Christ is the mature version of the Child in the painting, bringing salvation to the world by His death, at the same age as the resurrected children in the background; so it seems possible – and a logical balance – that one of the heads below him might represent a mature version of the young John the Baptist, and the heads at the bottom should be sculpted echoes of the beautiful, redeemed youths in the background. Furthermore, the inclusion of the five protruding heads in the paintings frame is often seen as a reference to a similar motif found on Ghiberti's Porta del Paradiso, the bronze doors of the Florence Baptistry which Michelangelo is known to have greatly admired. Furthering the Christ-as-gift metaphor, Mary's holding of Christ in the painting is seen to reference the elevating of the host during mass. Ceiling of the Udienza, Palagio di Parte Guelfa, Florence, and tondo by Luca Signorelli (c.1450-d.1523), Holy Family & saint, 1490-92, o/panel, 99 cm., Galleria Palatina, Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Regarding tondi commissioned for the interiors of public buildings, Olson describes the location of this Signorelli painting, also mentioned above by Cecchi. Given that, during the Renaissance, women were encouraged to look at images of beautiful children to ensure that their own children would be born perfect, in the image of Christ, paintings of the Madonna and Child were bound to be a more popular genre for furnishing the female areas of bedchambers, sitting-rooms, and galleries where exercise was taken. [7] He is in the middle-ground of the painting, between the Holy Family and the background. [28] Much importance is given to Joseph by way of the colors of his clothes: yellow, indicating the divine aspect of the family as well as "truth," and purple, standing for royal lineage tracing from the House of David. Detail of carved giltwood coffering with panels of lilies, ceiling  of the Sala dell’ Udienze, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence. Agnolo, a rich wool merchant, had married Maddalena Strozzi in 1504, and it is assumed that the room in question may have been their bridal chamber, and that the Doni Tondo was the centrepiece of this decorative scheme. II, ch. The second prophet’s head might be a saint particularly favoured by Doni or his wife (we know very little about them), in this way binding frame, painting and patron together, and providing an expansion of the picture into the outer world. The intarsia panels here are decorated with grotesques and arabesques in different woods, which include (above) satyrs’ heads and morphing foliate dolphins, which echo the ornament carved in three dimensions on the Doni Tondo frame. 137-80. The sacristy was finished by 1428, with the tondi designed as blank circular mouldings of pietra serena in the pendentives beneath the dome, and in the lunettes between them. Domenico Beccafumi, Holy Family with St John as a child and a donor,  c. 1528-35, Museo Horne, Florence. Born in 1475 in Caprese, Tuscany, Michelangelo was known as a Renaissance sculptor and architect, as well as a painter. 21-332) and this hypothesis has been repeated more recently by M. Lisner (‘Zum Rahmen von Michelangelos Madonna Doni’, Studien zur Geschichte der Europäischen, Plastik-Festscrift Theodor Muller, Munich, 1965, pp. "[3] Hayum also finds many allusions to Noah throughout the work. diam. contains some random words for machine learning natural language processing cat., Florence, 1982-83, pp.73-77, [18] Antonio Natali, ‘L’antico, le Scritture e l’occasione, Ipotesi sul Tondo Doni’, Gli Uffizi: Studi e Ricerche 2, Florence, 1985, pp. Michelangelo (1475-1564),  Doni Tondo, tempera on panel, 1505-06, 120 cm., Gallerie degli Uffizi. Given that Bruni himself was against opulence and display, perhaps it is significant that the worldly badge that he has left behind is much richer and more ornamental than the simple frieze and mouldings of the tondo representing the heaven that he is bound for. 86-101’, [51] Ibid., p. 145, note 30: ‘from BNCF, Fondo Tordi, 365, no I, c.28, which is the inventory complied when the house was being let to Alberto Bardi’. Moreover, his muscles and balance convey an upward movement, as if he is growing out of her, although he is above Mary, asserting his superiority to her. The structure of the frame, the shallow relief decorative border and the volutes ending in flowers are very reminiscent of a classical funerary altar , whilst the garland of fruit and foliage at the base and the urn of fruit and flowers at the crest both derive from so-called garland sarcophagi. One of the figures in the drawing, of a kneeling nun, is evidently the patron (or donor), and presumably wanted to command the best available image of the Madonna – either for the chapel of her convent or, since Olson’s conclusions point to the function of tondi more frequently as domestic devotional works, perhaps for the refectory. Roman mosaic tondo with Dionysos, a lion, cupids and maenads, 1st century BC, from House of the Centaur, Pompeii, Museo Archaeologico Nazionale, Naples. She also argues that the five figures may represent the five parts of the soul: the higher soul (soul and intellect) on the left and the lower soul (imagination, sensation, and nourishing faculty) on the right, a visual depiction of the views of Marsilio Ficino, whom Michelangelo references in other works. Un libro è un insieme di fogli, stampati oppure manoscritti, delle stesse dimensioni, rilegati insieme in un certo ordine e racchiusi da una copertina.. Il libro è il veicolo più diffuso del sapere. The success which the monumental setting of Michelangelo’s tondo had in the nearby city of Siena is witnessed by the richly carved and gilded frame of Beccafumi’s Holy Family with St John as a child and a donor, which is also traditionally given to Antonio Barili (1453-1516/17). Additionally, some scholars suggest that Michelangelo was inspired by the famous Greco-Roman group of Laocoön and His Sons, excavated in 1506 in Rome, an event at which Michelangelo is believed to have been present . 1390-1445),  Le devote meditatione sopra la passione del nostro signore, 1487, Metropolitan Museum, New York; detail of Donatello, David, c.1440s, bronze, Museo Nazionale de Bargello, Florence. Photo: Sailko; detail from Brogi, c. 1890-1903, Graphic & Photographic Collections of the Castello Sforzesco, Milan, Luca della Robbia (after; c.1399-1482), Madonna & Child with two angels, 1428, polychromed stucco, 40 cm. Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco (1463-1503) had been married off by his cousin in 1482, and one of the two seems to have commissioned Botticelli’s Primavera for the occasion. diam., Museo Civico, San Gimignano. overall, Christie’s, 7 October 2010, Lot 236. 52 -58, Lives of the Most Excellent Italian Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, from Cimabue to Our Times, Michelangelo Buonarroti, Doni Tondo, illustrated pigment analysis, The Creation of the Sun, Moon and Vegetation, Study of a Kneeling Nude Girl for The Entombment, Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, Restoration of the Sistine Chapel frescoes, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doni_Tondo&oldid=1007833961, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 20 February 2021, at 04:30. The garland framing a portrait sculpture on the Roman sarcophagus above is uncannily close to the carved and gilded frames of Madonna tondi, such as this one, mentioned by Cecchi, on Signorelli’s Madonna in Munich. It also echoes the architectural background to Botticelli’s portrait, and may reproduce contemporary miniature frames, if such things existed. diam., painting, c. 1445, 120 x 50 cm., Museo Casa Rodolfo Siviero, Florence. entry for Andrea della Robbia’s Prudence in the collection of the Met. ‘The fact that the face of the upper head in the frame – identifiable as Christ’s head… would not have been fully visible unless seen from below suggests that the panel was hung in a high position’ [57]. Cornflower is an attribute of Christ and symbolizes Heaven while hyssop symbolizes both the humility of Christ and baptism. Meanwhile, the frame of the Doni Tondo had been given in 1796 to Lorenzo di Credi’s Adoration of the Christ Child, which was then still in the Uffizi, as a photograph in the Zeri collection records (it is 5cm. There is some debate as to whether Mary is receiving the Child from Joseph or vice versa. Among the earliest examples known today are the polychrome stucco tondo of the Madonna & Child with two angels in the Ashmolean, an early work by or after Luca della Robbia, c.1428, and the marble versions by Rossellino and Desiderio in the lunettes of funerary monuments to Leonardo Bruni and Carlo Marsuppini in Santa Croce [2]. La Rinascenza a Firenze: Il Quattrocento, Istituto Treccani, Rome, 1986, p. 231, [6] Ronald Lightbown, Sandro Botticelli, London, 1978, vol. 73, pp. 1, March 1975, p. 33; the backboard of the lettuccio also had a cappellinaio or set of pegs for hanging hats on. diam., valued at 180 lire), and it may be that the former (another mythological/ humanist work) was also framed in white; the tondo more conventionally having a gilded frame [62]. The subdued, earthy tones of the stucchi harmonize with the monochrome interior as Brunelleschi conceived it; so that, although he disagreed with the importation of any image, ornament or decorative architectural features into the sacristy, he did not have to face the greater extreme of brightly-painted frescos or altarpieces. The Doni Tondo or Doni Madonna, is the only finished panel painting by the mature Michelangelo to survive. VII, cc. [18] The pose of the nude figure in the background immediately behind Saint Joseph, to our right, appears to have been influenced by the twisting contortions of the figures captured by the serpent in the Laocoön (again, if this were so, it would alter the date of the Doni Tondo by several years). Michelangelo depicts Christ as if he is growing out of Mary's shoulder to take human form, one leg hanging limply and the other not visible at all, therefore making him a part of Mary. Masaccio (after; c.1401-28), The Berlin Tondo, desco da parto, c.1427-28, tempera and gold leaf on panel, 56 cm. Olson has no explanation as to why the desco da parto seems to have had a relatively short life, being replaced in the home (as it appears) by circular paintings of (especially) the Madonna and Child, but it may have been a purely utilitarian change: using a detailed oil painting with a carved giltwood frame as a tray might have come to seem wilfully destructive, and the deschi may have spent much of their time spent propped up vertically, to be appreciated rather than used. Michelangelo’s tondo was to be part of the decoration of this room from the beginning, and it is logical to assume that the craftsmen responsible for the rest of the interior would be commissioned to make the frame [23]. ‘… cassoni with spalliere [back panels] by Morto da Feltro, decorated with guilloche and grotesques, and beautiful pilasters carved by Tasso…’ [52]. Francesco del Tasso (1463-1519), attrib., or a member of his family, tondo frame, 1510-40, poplar & walnut, V & A, on loan to National Gallery, London, Detail of the Doni Tondo frame; detail of Tasso frame, V & A. Olson notes that these frescoed tondi ‘were faster and cheaper than panels… In addition, including a tondo was a good way to make the decoration more au courant’ [46]. These were commissioned to hang in the Audience Chamber of the Palazzo del Popolo in 1482, and were initially projected as being two panels, either square or round, whichever would appear best (presumably to the two citizens chosen to oversee their execution). The museum entry suggests that it was ‘made in connection with a wall tomb’, and adds that, ‘…the round shape suggests an occulus, an opening to Heaven, through which the soul of the deceased… might pass, there to be welcomed by the Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ and divine intercessor with God…’, Bernardo Rossellino (1409-64), tomb of Leonardo Bruni, 1446-48, marble, 610 cm. Bartolomeo de Libri, © Fundacja Książąt Czartoryskich, Biblioteka Cyfrowa, Muzeum Narodowe w Krakowie. 14, no 27, pp.31-65, [38] Ibid., p. 40, and see notes 85-87, pp. [1] Moritz Hauptmann Der Tondo, Ursprung, Bedeutung und Geschichte des Italienischen Rundbildes in Relief und Malerei, Frankfurt, 1936, [2] Hauptmann, Die plastiche Maddonnentondo, pp.119 ff, [3] Attilio Schiaparelli, La casa fiorentina e i suoi arredi nel seccoli XIV e XV, Florence, 1908, reprinted 1973, pp. 21-24) and is republished here in an English translation by The Frame Blog, with extra illustrations; and additional notes, which include reference to Roberta Olson’s ‘Lost and partially found: the tondo, a significant Florentine art-form, in documents of the Renaissance’, Artibus et historiae, 1993, vol. [23] Additionally, in looking at them as separate groupings, she suggests that the two figures on Mary's right represents the human and divine natures of Christ, while the three on her left represent the Trinity. The bound urns or cornucopiae at the base from which the two branches of leaves and fruit spring, and the flower at the top where they meet; even the variety of fruit – they might all have been translated into giltwood by a carver who has studied similar classical garlands, sketched them carefully, and then re-used them in his own medium. Michelangelo used a limited palette of pigments[15] comprising Lead White, Azurite, Verdigris and a few others. Within this iconographical tradition, the first known tondo by Botticelli also depicts an Adoration of the Magi (National Gallery, London, c. 1473), followed, amongst others, by the Raczinsky tondo, which was possibly executed for San Salvatore al Monte and is now in the Gemäldegalerie [6]. ‘the chambers of several early 16th century households featured tondi set in elaborate frames with candleholders’ [65]. ; 1429/30-64), marble, 87 x 51 cm., Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Francesco del Tasso, who died aged 56 in 1519, worked in Florence, Perugia and Pistoia: much of his output, however, has vanished, the choir of Santissima Annunziata in Pistoia, for instance, probably having been looted from its second home in a convent by Napoleonic forces. [11], Andrée Hayum argues that the commissioning of the tondo by the Doni family helped to emphasize the "secular and domestic ideals" of the painting rather than seeing it as a "devotional object. Very sadly, given this documentary record and the high value put on the work, the original frame described in the inventory hasn’t survived, and the panel has been put into a copy of the frame by the Maiano workshop on Botticelli’s Madonna of the pomegranate, which is thirty or more years later than the Fra Angelico/Filippo Lippi panel. [19] The anemone plant represents the Trinity and the Passion of Christ. E per il Polo Museale della Città di Firenze, Gabinetto Fotografico, neg. Whilst the structural alterations and decorative work were proceeding, the works of art intended for the palazzo were commissioned, and here, according to the Anonimo Magliabechiano [13], Botticelli played an important part: he executed a painting of the Three Kings above the staircase of the Catena, and, on 5 October 1482, he and Ghirlandaio were commissioned to paint a fresco on one wall of the Udienza. ; fl/ 490-470 BC), red-figured kylix with a symposiast, Philippos, & a dancing girl, Kallisto, 490-480 BC, pottery, image 17.3 cm. This tondo, however, is not framed with garland of fruit, leaves or symbolic lilies, but with an egg-&-dart moulding, like the divisions between so many compartmentalized frescos. Photo: Sailko. A sum of 80 lire for the paintings and 40 for the frames seems to have been allocated [38]. The red ribbon spiralling around the Virgin’s frame has been painted with white daisies and little florets (much as one would find on a Northern altarpiece), daisies standing for innocence or humility. Olson’s article on tondo frames concludes by considering the place of sculptured tondi in relation to painted versions, probably as forerunners of the latter: for instance, the Luca della Robbia stucco Madonna & Child with two angels in the Ashmolean, which is dated 1428 on the back, and this Donatello bronze relief (above) in Vienna. Michelangelo’s composition was thus designed to give Maddalena a symbol of mercy in the figure of the Madonna, the model for a future perfect child in the Christ Child, and a model for her family in the Holy Family. The Virgin's placement and emphasis is due to her role in human salvation. [44] For garland frames see ‘Fruit, flowers, foliage…’, op.cit. [50] Ibid., p. 143, note 26: ‘discovered and published by L. Aquino, ‘La camera di Lodovico de Nobili opera di Francesco del Tasso e qualche precisazione sulla cornice de tondo Doni’, Paragone: arte, LVI, 2005, pp. Her section on the Inventories of the Magistato dei Pupilli Avanti Il Principato (inventories of possessions in what equated to the remit of the English Court of Chancery) notes that: ‘Since most Florentine homes during the 15th and early 16th centuries probably did not have chapels, and evidence suggests there were no altars within the chambers, special attention seems to have been paid to the installation of selected devotional objects. Raphael, Madonna della Seggiola, 1514, 71 cm., diam., reframed in the late 17th or early 18th century, Galleria Palatina, Palazzo Pitti, Lorenzo di Credi (c.1460-1537), Madonna adoring the Child, with John the Baptist, St Joseph & an angel, c. 1500-24, o/panel, 115 cm.