Andrea della Robbia, in full Andrea di Marco di Simone della
Robbia (born October 20, 1435, Florence [Italy] – died August
4, 1525), Florentine sculptor who was the nephew of Luca della Robbia
and assumed control of the family workshop after his uncle's death in 1482.
Like Luca, Andrea della Robbia was apparently trained as a marble sculptor.
His best-known works are 10 roundels of foundlings in swaddling clothes on
the facade of Filippo Brunelleschi's
Ospedale degli Innocenti in Florence
(c. 1463). Andrea's interest in narrative sculpture led him to develop from
the reliefs of Luca a class of large polychrome reliefs, of which
characteristic examples exist at numerous churches in Italy, including the
Franciscan shrine at La Verna and Santa Croce in Florence, as well as many
museums outside Italy. The development of Andrea's style between 1475 and
1522 can be followed through a sequence of dated or documented works. Many
of his smaller reliefs exist in a quantity of versions turned out from the
della Robbia studio.
From October of 1916 through January of 1917, Rudolf Steiner gave a series
of nine lectures known as the Art Course. These lectures were given
the title of:
The History of Art.
Click here to discover what Steiner said about Andrea della Robbia in the
ninth lecture,
or in the entire
lecture series.