WOOD. — From the earliest manifestations of Mediterranean civilization, fine wood materials were employed in the applied arts. During the Paleo-Christian and Byzantine periods, noteworthy examples include the doors of St. Ambrose in Milan, and above all the magnificent doors of St. Sabina in Rome (5th century), made of cypress wood, with panels depicting biblical scenes and frames adorned with vegetal motifs.
During the full flowering of the Romanesque period, there emerged expressions of authentic polychrome statuary, such as the Madonna in Majesty from S. Maria Maggiore in Altari, now in the Museum of the Palazzo Venezia, along with the poignant, folk-style Depositions from the cathedral of Tivoli and the cathedral of Volterra. Even in German lands, wood sculpture, before the height of Gothic art, was cultivated with success, as evidenced by the Madonna of the Treasury in Essen Cathedral, the Crucifix in Brunswick Cathedral, and the door of St. Maria im Kapitol in Cologne. But it was the 14th century that fostered an extraordinarily fertile and multifaceted development in the art of wood: with coffered ceilings and panelled ceilings, with choir stalls and lecterns in ecclesiastical choirs, with pulpits, altars, cathedras, anchors, and furniture of every kind and use.
In Italy, the Pisan sculptors prevailed with their tender Annunciations and the builders of carved stalls, such as those in Orvieto Cathedral (designed by the Sienese Vanni di Tura), Siena Cathedral (by Francesco del Tonchio), and S. Domenico in Ferrara, where the exquisite skill of Giovanni da Baiso shines forth—a master of ecclesiastical cabinetmaking in the Po Valley. Toward the end of the 1300s, the Fleming Jacques de Baerze was in vogue in Burgundy with his carved altarpieces.
At the dawn of the Renaissance and for several decades thereafter, Gothic structures and ornamentation continued everywhere, as seen in the carved choirs of the chapel in the Palazzo della Signoria in Siena (1428) and of the church of S. Stefano in Venice (late 15th century); in the exquisite intarsia of Piacenza Cathedral, executed around 1480 by Antonio Burlenghi; and in the lavish ceiling of the former Chapter Hall of the Carità in Venice, executed by Marco Cozzi of Vicenza, who also crafted the choir of S. Maria dei Frari. Yet certain great artists of 15th-century Tuscany did not disdain wood sculpture, and it suffices to mention the two celebrated Crucifixes by Filippo Brunelleschi and Donatello, respectively in the churches of S. Maria Novella and S. Croce in Florence, the ascetic Magdalene by Donatello in the Baptistery of that city, and the statues by Jacopo della Quercia’s pupils in Siena. Tuscan masters also spearheaded the renewal of intarsia work, not without some pictorial applications, achieved through the use of long, flexible laminas bent and twisted in every direction. In Florence, Giuliano and Benedetto da Maiano excelled with decorations in the Palazzo Vecchio and the sacristy of S. Maria del Fiore, featuring putti and festive della Robbia-style garlands; the artisan dynasty of the Del Tasso family, whose greatest exponent was Domenico, created the wondrous, flower-adorned Audience Hall in the Collegio del Cambio in Perugia (c. 1490); Baccio d’Agnolo, a prolific maker of carved furniture and cassoni; and Battista del Cinque, who worked in the Laurentian Library on designs by Michelangelo.
In Siena, Antonio di Neri and Giovanni, known as Barile, enjoyed great renown (the latter executed the magnificent doors of the Vatican Rooms in Rome); Giovanni Piffero, creator of the organ in the chapel of the Palazzo della Signoria; and Bartolomeo Neroni, called il Riccio. In northern Italy, the inventive genius and technical skill of Fra’ Giovanni da Verona triumphed, along with his pupils Fra’ Raffaello da Brescia and Fra’ Vincenzo delle Vacche; Fra’ Damiano da Bergamo (among whose circle was Gianfrancesco Capodiferro); Marcantonio Zucchi in Piacenza; the Marchesi da Formigine in Bologna; the Mandelli and Prospero Clementi in Reggio Emilia; the Frenchman Riccardo Taurino in Padua; and Ambrogio Santagostino, as well as Anselmo and Virgilio Del Conte in Milan.
The development of Renaissance forms was splendidly complemented by polychrome intarsia work, with its marvelous pictorial and perspectival effects, first achieved by the aforementioned Giuliano and Benedetto da Maiano, Domenico d’Antonio Indivino of Sanseverino (stalls in the Upper Basilica of S. Francesco in Assisi), the Modenese Bartolomeo dei Polli (choir of the Certosa di Pavia, designed by the painter Borgognone), Lorenzo and Cristoforo Canozi da Lendinara, under the influence of Piero della Francesca (Modena Cathedral), and Baccio Pontelli, who directed the work in the famous studiolo of Federico da Montefeltro in Urbino (the figures of the Three Theological Virtues are believed to have been executed from designs by Sandro Botticelli). In the following 16th century, intarsia reached the pinnacle of pictorial refinement and technical mastery, achieving even aerial perspective effects, with the aforementioned Fra’ Giovanni da Verona (choir stalls in the monastery church of the Maddalena, ceiling of S. Clemente, and organ of S. Maria in Vallicella); Bernardino Mosca in Abruzzo, credited with the exquisite ceiling of S. Bernardino in L’Aquila; and in Naples, the carvers of the tribunes and cantorias of S. Chiara and the spectacle carriages of the Bourbon court.
Throughout the entire 18th century, partly under French influence, furniture—especially in Venice with its polychrome lacquerwork, imitated in the Far East—flourished in a variety of styles, as did examples from Piedmont, Liguria, and Bologna. In the second half of the century, the Lombard Giuseppe Maggiolini established a distinctive style of floral and landscape intarsia, gracefully integrating it into the overly restrained linearity of Neoclassical taste. The art of furniture reached its highest expression particularly in France, from the reign of Henry IV to that of Louis XVI, with renowned cabinetmakers such as André Charles Boulle and Charles Crescent.
— See pl. LXX.