David

Commissioned from Donatello by the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore in 1408 to adorn, together with the Isaiah ordered a month earlier from Nanni di Banco, one of the buttresses of the church's tribunes, the “David” was moved in 1416 to the Palazzo della Signoria, and on that occasion was partly reworked by the artist. Some scholars believe that the head of Goliath is among the reworked parts. And indeed the flowing modelling of the head, which avoids any pretext of Gothic mannerism or formal crystallization and unifies the image in a serene and relaxed naturalistic nobility, seems to be a later achievement than the moment of formal, antique-inspired insistence of the statues of “St. Mark” and “St. Peter” executed for Orsanmichele and of the “St. John the Evangelist” from the old façade of the Cathedral.