Donatello Exhibit a Coup for Museum of Biblical Art

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New Yorkers are being afforded a rare opportunity to view some of the monumental works of Florentine early Renaissance sculptor Donatello (1386-1466) at the Museum of Biblical Art (MOBIA). The Exhibition, “Sculpture in the Age of Donatello: Renaissance Masterpieces From Florence Cathedral,” is the last to be mounted at the museum at Broadway and 61st Street before it closes its current location at the end of June.

The exhibition is extraordinary, first because the giant, fragile statues, originally commissioned to adorn Florence’s Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore (popularly known as the Duomo), are virtually never seen outside Italy where they reside at Florence’s Museo dell’ Opera del Duomo, the cathedral’s museum.

It is also a huge coup for MOBIA because exhibitions of this kind are usually mounted at far larger and more imposing institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The cathedral museum made the exhibition available while it is carrying out extensive renovations and it is likely the only time the masterworks will travel to the United States.

The presentation consists of 23 pieces, including three Donatello masterpieces, one of which, Prophet, thought to be Old Testament prophet Habakkuk, is considered by critics to be perhaps his greatest work. Two other imposing pieces are Donatello’s St. John the Evangelist, and St. Luke, by Donatello associate and artistic rival, Nanni di Banco (circa 1386-1421).

The works of other Renaissance Florence artists of the period, as well as a wooden model of the famous cathedral dome, are also presented.

The Museum of Biblical Art will remain at its present location through the full run of Sculpture in the Age of Donatello, which closes June 14. With the recent sale by the American Bible Society of the 1865 Broadway building—also the home of the Museum of Biblical Art—the museum must now find new quarters.

The museum, an independent, nonprofit arts and education organization, is not part of the American Bible Society and thus will not be joining the society in its move to Philadelphia.

While the museum acknowledges finding a new site will be a challenge, according to its website it is in active conversations regarding possible new locations in Manhattan, and several options are being considered.