ABSTRACT
This book explores the materiality of terracotta sculpture in the Early Modern Europe. Individual contributions present a broad geographical perspective showcasing examples of modelling, firing, painting, and gilding of clay in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands. The volume considers known artworks by celebrated artists, such as Luca della Robbia, Andrea del Verrocchio, Filipe Hodart, or Hans Reichle, in parallel with several lesser-studied terracotta sculptures and tin-glazed earthenware made by anonymous artisans. Through meticulously researched case studies the book challenges arbitrary distinctions into the fine art and the applied arts, that obscured the image of artistic production in the Early Modern world. The centrality of clay in the creative processes of artists working with two- and three-dimensional artefacts comes to the fore. The role of terracotta figures in religious practices, as well as processes of material substitutions or mimesis, confirm the medium's significance for European visual and material culture in general. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, all terracotta sculptures solicited a complementary range of interactions through the agency of their material and form.
