The Pistoia Crucifix

c. 1600/1616

Pietro Tacca

Artist, Florentine, 1577 - 1640

The body of a man cast from bronze hangs heavily from nails driven through his hands and both feet on a wooden cross in this sculpture, which would hang on a wall. The man’s head hangs down to our left, eyes closed as his shoulders shift to our left and his hips to our right. A ring of thorns encircles long, wavy hair. His torso and legs are lean and muscular, and he wears only a loincloth tied across his hips. His arms are unnaturally long and sinewy. A bronze banner with the letters “INRI” is affixed to the vertical beam near the top of the cross. The surface of the wood cross is dinged and speckled with worm holes, and the edges of the face of the cross are painted gold.

Media Options

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This bronze has been called the most beautiful of many crucifixes ascribed to Pietro Tacca, including examples at the royal monastery of the Escorial in Spain and at the cathedrals of Prato and Pisa. Tacca, son of a marble merchant from Carrara, mastered bronze in Florence as a principal assistant to Giovanni Bologna, whom he succeeded in 1609 as sculptor to the Grand Duke. Although the twisting pose reflects the elegance of the celebrated older master, Tacca's personal pursuit of realism and pathos is revealed in the gaunt figure with protruding bones and also in flesh pushed up by nails, bulging closed eyes, and an aggressively spiky crown of thorns.
On View

West Building Ground Floor, Gallery G10

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    bronze

  • Credit Line

    Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund

  • Dimensions

    overall (corpus): 86.9 x 79 x 20.6 cm (34 3/16 x 31 1/8 x 8 1/8 in.)
    overall (cross): 167 x 90.1 cm (65 3/4 x 35 1/2 in.)

  • Accession

    1973.9.1

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Probably made for, or contemporaneously purchased for, Church of S. Maria degli Angeli, Pistoia [convent suppressed 1867, church closed 1886]; art market, Florence, early 1900s; purchased by Count Giorgio Piccolomini Adami [d. 1943], Siena; by inheritance to Contessa Piccolomini, Siena; private collection, Rome, by 1954; private collection, Switzerland, by 1958; purchased 1968 by (Heim Gallery, London); Angus Hood, England;[1] purchased 13 May 1974 through (Heim Gallery, London) by NGA.
[1] This object, along with others from the Hood collection, was on deposit at the City Museum and Art Gallery, Birmingham, England, from 1969 to 1973. The Heim Gallery's index card file of objects sold, no. W6298, confirms the Hood collection provenance (Getty Research Institute, Heim Gallery Records, Box 108).

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1974

  • Recent Acquisitions and Promised Gifts: Sculpture, Drawings, Prints, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1974, no. II, repro.

Bibliography

1984

  • Torriti, Piero. Pietro Tacca da Carrara. Genova, 1984: 91, 93 - 96, repro.

1991

  • Kopper, Philip. America's National Gallery of Art: A Gift to the Nation. New York, 1991: 295, repro.

1994

  • Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1994: 223, repro.

2000

  • National Gallery of Art Special Issue. Connaissance des Arts. Paris, 2000:61.

2001

  • Baldry Beccatini, Francesca. Il Crocifisso di Pietro Tacca a Settignano. Restauro di un’inedita cartapesta policroma. Florence, 2001: 24-25, repro.

2007

  • Montigiani, Vanessa. In Franca Falletti, ed. Pietro Tacca. Carrara, La Toscana, le grandi corti europee. Exh. cat. Carrara, Centro internazionale delle arti plastiche, 2007: 88-90, repro., n. 100-101.

Inscriptions

on banner at top of cross: INRI

Wikidata ID

Q63854783

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