Young Woman Portrait - Item #242

 

19 Inches High x 18 Inches Wide x 9 Inches Deep

Female portrait busts created during the Quattrocento are very similar in style, making it difficult to definitively confirm sculptors as well as sitters. However, the artist of this work succeeded in giving an expression to the sitter, as seen in the raised eyebrows and small smile. After much consideration, art historians attributed the bust to Florentine sculptor Desiderio da Settignano (c.1429-1464). Desiderio was a master at portraying the faces of women and children in his sculptures, several of which can be found in the Caproni Collection.

Regarding the subject of the portrait, it has been speculated she may be Marietta Strozzi (1448-c.1498) who was considered the most beautiful woman in 15th-century Florence. Almost every female portrait of the time has been evaluated as a potential match for the legendary bust of Marietta by Desiderio described in Giorgio Vasari’s 1550 book The Lives as well as other sources. Currently, no bust has been identified as the one depicting Marietta. Art historian Arnold Victor Coonin also notes that based on the years of Desiderio’s death and Marietta’s birth, she would have been no more than fifteen years old when he died nor was she betrothed or recently wed, which were two of the few reasons to commission a woman’s portrait at the time. The window of opportunity for the creation of the bust was quite short. Despite the mystery of the sitter’s identity, this beautiful female bust by Desiderio is a well-known and loved Renaissance work.

 

Artist: Desiderio da Settignano

Museum: Bargello National Museum, Florence

Time Period: Renaissance, c. 1461-1464

1911 Catalog ID # - 5167

 

Sources:

Coonin, Arnold Victor. “The Most Elusive Woman in Renaissance Art: A Portrait of Marietta Strozzi.” Artibus et Historiae, vol. 30, no. 59, 2009, pp. 41–64. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40343663.