NICCOLÒ DELL'ARCA

NICCOLÒ dell'ARCA. – Also called N. da Bari or N. d'Apulia after his birthplace. Italian sculptor, born around 1435 and died in Bologna in 1494.

From 1469 to 1473 he worked on the Arca di S. Domenico (from which his nickname derives), adding to the pre-existing work of N. Pisano and his pupils the cornice with the Evangelists, the Eternal Father, and the Christ in the sarcophagus between two angels and five saints. In this celebrated work, N. brings to life, in a fantastic world, expressions of Franco-Flemish art combined with effects of exquisitely Tuscan grace. The terracotta bust depicting s. Domenico, in the same Bolognese church, perhaps dates from 1474; it is easy to discern in it a minutely descriptive character that finds a counterpart in certain more naturalistic details of the Arca, while the colossal Madonna di Piazza, in the Palazzo comunale of Bologna, dated 1478, bears witness to a new stylistic phase of N., reflecting the art of Verrocchio. Still in Bologna, he executed with broad and balanced grandeur the terracotta eagle for the portal of S. Giovanni in Monte, datable to shortly before 1481,

the year in which the façade itself was completed. N.’s masterpiece is the terracotta group depicting the Compianto sul Cristo morto, in the Bolognese church of S. Maria della Vita, which reflects the influence of Ferrarese art that flourished in Bologna with Cossa and Roberti during the last thirty years of the century. This influence is especially evident in the dramatic figures of the Maries and s. Giovanni, who are posed in a manner revealing the most intense emotion, while their garments are violently agitated by a raging storm. – Vedi tav. CXV.