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Andrea del Verrocchio and Leonardo da Vinci,
Baptism of Christ, Florence, Uffizi, 1472-5, oil on wood, 177 x 151 cm.
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Looking at post-renaissance representations of Leonardo and
Verrocchio’s relationship- such as Gigoux’s take on the master-pupil bond- we
might assume that the elder master was so distraught at his pupil’s precocity
that he abandoned his palette and paintbrush in despair. This impinges on the
topic of Verrocchio’s ability as a painter, which has been the subject of some
discussion.
A glance at a painted Head of St Jerome seems
to confirm that Verrocchio had talent as a painter early in his career, and
that he painted studies of “character heads” which undoubtedly influenced the
young Leonardo. According to David Alan Brown, Verrocchio only began to learn
to paint after the Baptism of Christ, and when he was simultaneously working on
the sculpture group, the Incredulity of St Thomas for Orsanmichele. According
to this theory Verrocchio only began painting after he was a confirmed
sculptor; his interest in sculpture probably dates from about 1461 when he
competed with Desiderio and Giuliano da Maiano for a commission at Orvieto.
Verrocchio also felt the need to surround himself with pupils who would help
him with the demands of the painting, leaving him more time for sculptural
projects.
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| Andrea del Verrocchio, Head of St Donatus, Private Collection, New York, probably 1470s. |
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Verrocchio, Putto with a Dolphin, c. 1470,
Florence, Palazzo Vecchio, marble, 125 cm.
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While many of Verrocchio’s pupils were adept painters, it was only
Leonardo who was the pupil who could work in both painting and sculpture. It
may well be the case that Leonardo conceived his ideas about the paragone, the
comparison between the arts, in his formative years in his master’s studio. As
for Verrocchio, he gained greater recognition as a sculptor; he characterised
himself as a “chiseler” in the land office registers of 1470 and 1480, and in
his will he is remembered as a “sculptor”. However, in the documents for his
admission to another society in 1570, Verrocchio is described as a “painter.”
Verrocchio’s painting ability can be seen in the wonderful Head of St Donato
(Private Coll., New York) which was probably a study for a marble bust, typical
of the sort of works that Verrocchio and his pupils did in the workshop- both
sculptural and pictorial. Indeed, Verrocchio was ahead of his time in rejecting
the traditional view that a sculpture should have a main point from which it
could be viewed; he was an advocate of the multiple viewpoint. An example of
Verrocchio putting his multi-view approach into operation can be seen in the Putto
with a Dolphin, which describes a twisting, swerving motion. This
encourages the spectator to move around the sculpture instead of viewing the
marble stationary from a single location. Verrocchio’s use of space in his
paintings of Madonnas, e.g. the Berlin Madonna and Child, which with its use of
multi-viewpoints, suggests the knowledge of the sculptor too. Leonardo’s first sculptural projects, made in
his youth in Florence, show this multi-view method.
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| Verrocchio, Madonna and Child, Staatliche
Museen, Berlin, 1470, oil on poplar, 76 x 55 cm. |
