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Visualizing the Immaculate Conception: Donatello, Francesco della Rovere, and the High Altar and Choir Screen at the Church of the Santo in Padua

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Sarah Blake McHam
Sarah Blake McHam*
Affiliation:
Rutgers University
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Abstract

This essay contends that Donatello’s High Altar at the Santo in Padua represents the Immaculate Virgin, reflecting a controversial doctrine of burgeoning interest in fifteenth-century Italy that she was exempted from original sin prior to the first moment of her conception. It ties the altar and scenes on the surrounding choir screen to a sermon promoting the Virgin’s immaculacy by Francesco della Rovere (later Sixtus IV), spoken in Padua in 1448 while the altar was being erected. It further connects the liturgical ensemble with bulls by Sixtus IV and liturgical offices sponsored by him after he was elected pope.

Type
Studies
Information
Renaissance Quarterly , Volume 69 , Issue 3 , Fall 2016 , pp. 831 - 864
Copyright
Copyright © 2016 Renaissance Society of America

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