Young Boy in a Garland (called ""The Infant St. John"")

Abstract

The face of the child featured in this terracotta tondo has been cold painted, whereas the rest of the sculpture is glazed. The work can be found today in the Museo Bandini in Fiesole. The work is attributed to Luca della Robbia the younger, one of the sons of Andrea della Robbia. Images such as these of beautiful young boys (sometimes Jesus or John the Baptist, but sometimes without any attributes of holiness) were popular in the Renaissance, as such works were thought to be models for good behaviour and, more crucially, to help cause women to have beautiful male children. Photograph(s) licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.