Ghiberti, LORENZO

Ghiberti, LORENZO, an Italian goldsmith, bronze-caster, and sculptor, was born at Florence about 1378. He was apprenticed to his stepfather, a skilful goldsmith, and also acquired dexterity in drawing, painting, and modelling. In 1400 he executed a noble fresco in the palazzo of Pandolfo Malatesta at Rimini. Along with other artists, he was next chosen (1401) by the Florentine guild of merchants to compete for the execution of a gate in bronze, to match that executed by Andrea Pisano in the baptistery in 1336. The subject of the design was 'The Sacrifice of Isaac,' to be executed in bas-relief as a model for one of the panels. The judges selected Ghiberti's design, both on account of the art and beauty of its conception and the delicacy and skill of its execution. When Ghiberti had completed this great work (1424) his fellow-citizens entrusted him with the execution of another gate, to emulate the two already adorning the baptistery. This second gate, finished in 1452, contains ten reliefs on a larger scale, the subjects in this case also being wholly biblical. The mingled grace and grandeur of these compositions is beyond all praise; though his treatment of bas-relief has been condemned as wrong in principle. On the two gates he spent fifty years of most patient labour. Not the least of Ghiberti's merits was the success that attended his efforts to break down the conventionalism that before his day hampered the free development of sculptural art. Among his other works may be mentioned the sepulchral monuments of Dati in Santa Maria Novella, and of the Albizzi in Santa Croce at Florence, executed about 1427; a bronze relief in the Duomo, representing St Zenobius bringing a dead child to life (1440); and between 1414 and 1422 bronze statues of St John the Baptist, St Matthew, and St Stephen for the church of Or San Michele. Ghiberti died at Florence, 1st December 1455. See Perkins, Ghiberti et son École (Paris, 1885).