Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
ADJUNCT MODULE B: ITALIAN ART
Preferred Title:
Foundling Infants Roundels (in situ)
Alternate Title:
Infants in Swaddling Clothes
Image View:
Two tondi in half spandrels next to a pilaster; one of the left is a recreation
Creator:
Andrea della Robbia (Italian ceramicist, 1435-ca. 1528)
Location:
repository: Museo dell'Ospedale degli Innocenti (Florence, Tuscany, Italy)
Location Note:
Piazza SS. Annunziata, 13; Ospedale degli Innocenti exterior
GPS:
43.776308 11.261214
Date:
ca. 1487-1490 (creation)
Cultural Context:
Italian
Style Period:
Fifteenth century; Renaissance
Work Type 1:
tondo
Work Type 2:
bas-relief (sculpture)
Classification:
Sculpture and Installations
Material:
tin-glazed ceramic
Technique:
casting (process); fabrication attributes: ceramics
Subjects:
genre; human figure; infants; swaddling clothes; foundlings; babies
Description:
The façade is made up of nine semicircular arches springing from columns of the Composite order. In the spandrels of the arches there are tin-glazed blue terracotta roundels with reliefs of babies designed by Andrea della Robbia suggesting the function of the building (a foundling orphanage). Ten roundels were installed in ca. 1487, all unique in terms of pose and details of the swaddling clothes. In 1845, 2 additional pairs of "bambini," reproductions of some of the originals, were installed at either end. A few of the tondi are still the original ones, but most of the original surviving tondi have been moved inside to the museum. (Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.oxfordart online.com/)
Collection:
Adjunct Module B: Italian Art
Identifier:
6A1-ROBBIA-MI-PSC-A1 1
Rights:
© Scott Gilchrist, Archivision, Inc.

Foundling Infants Roundels (in situ)