Only about fifty miles separate Florence and Siena. However, if we compare Florentine pictures to these painted during the same period in Siena, we might believe we have stepped through time, not space. The gold backgrounds, the rich pattern and tooled detail, the saints and angels standing in formation—all seem more at home in the late Middle Ages than in the early Renaissance.

Though they did not rush to embrace them, Sienese artists were aware of the innovations in Florentine painting. They experimented with its naturalism, its solid, three-dimensional forms, its one-point perspective, and eventually its secular outlook—but their paintings remain distinctly Sienese. On some level artists may have eschewed outside innovations as their own city's economic and political fortunes declined. Certainly their patrons continued to expect works that were in keeping with an older Sienese tradition. For more than one hundred years the powerful legacy of early fourteenth-century masters like Duccio and Simone Martini sustained a preference for color and pattern, refinement and decoration. These artists' venerable images decorated the city's churches and public buildings, remaining part of the fabric of life. Saint Bernardino, a contemporary of the artists here, exhorted listeners to emulate the humility of a Virgin painted by Simone Martini. Such authority discouraged radical departures in style.

Devotion to the Virgin—and her images—was strong. She was Siena's patron saint and appeared on the city's coins. Her veneration had an important civic component, and in Siena artistic patronage was a largely civic enterprise. Into the 1400s many commissions were still communal, funded by the city or religious fraternities. Humanism, which had fueled demand for secular subjects and increased private patronage in Florence, came late to Siena.

Biography

Beginnings

Traces of Duccio’s association with Cimabue remain in the large round stained-glass window of the choir of the Siena cathedral, for which Duccio made the designs. This work was commissioned between 1287 and 1288 and is the earliest known example of stained glass produced by an Italian.

There is little documented information about Duccio's life and career. In large part his life must be reconstructed from the evidence of those works that can be attributed to him with certainty, from the evidence contained in his stylistic development, and from the learning his paintings reveal. Duccio's father was from the town of Buoninsegna, near Siena, but at the time of Duccio's birth he lived in the town of Camporegio. He is first mentioned in 1278, when the treasurer of the commune of Siena commissioned him to decorate 12 strongboxes for documents. The following year he was given the task of decorating one of the wooden covers of the account books of the treasury. That Duccio was doing work more appropriate for an artisan than an artistmust not lead one to assume that even at this time he was only a beginner. It is known that services of this type were requested, both in Siena and in Florence, of already established painters. Further, the fact that he was designated as “painter” and was working for himself demonstrate that he was a mature and independent artist by 1278. In 1280 Duccio was fined the large sum of 100 lire by the commune of Siena for some unrecorded misconduct. This was the first of a considerable number of fines that the artist incurred at various times and for various reasons, and they suggest that he was of a restless and rebellious temperament. He was fined more than once for nonpayment of debts; in 1295 he was penalized for refusing to pledge allegiance to the head of the popolo party; in 1302 for not appearing for military duty; and in the same year for what appears to have been practicing sorcery.

The “Madonna Rucellai.” On April 15, 1285, the Compagnia dei Laudesi, or singers of praise, of the Virgin Mary at the church of Sta. Maria Novella in Florence, commissioned “Duccio di Buoninsegna, painter of Siena” to paint a great altarpiece that was to represent the Madonna and Child together with otherfigures. For the work he was to be paid 150florins, but if the painting, which had to be “a most beautiful picture” and had to havea gold border, was not satisfactory, the artist would receive no reimbursement. Despite the fact that this employment contract, preserved in the State Archives of Florence, came to light in 1790 and was published in 1854, it was only in 1930 that it was indisputably determined that the document referred to the Madonna of Sta. Maria Novella, now called the “Madonna Rucellai.” From the time of Giorgio Vasari, a minor Florentine Renaissance painter who was the earliest, and probably the most influential, biographer of early Italian artists, this altarpiece, which was the largest yet painted, was considered to be a masterpiece of the Florentine painter Cimabue. Vasari's attribution, whereas it was probably due in part to a desire not to deprive the Florentine school and its founder of credit for so brilliant a work, was accepted almost unanimously until the present century because of strong similarities to thework of Cimabue in the “Madonna Rucellai.” Some recent critics, no longer able to deny that the work is by Duccio, have concluded that he was a pupil, and in all essentials of his art even an imitator, of Cimabue.
The problem of the relative influence of Cimabue upon Duccio is critically very complex. The “Madonna Rucellai” shows affinities with the work of Cimabue in the type of the Virgin, in the serious and robust Child, and in the faces of the six adoring angels; nevertheless, it reveals strikingly new stylistic innovations in the softness of the angels set in midair, in the elegant and subtle lines, in the first feeling of French Gothic animated sweetness and spirituality, and in the light and shade modulation of the free-flowing, clear brush strokes.
There is no doubt that his knowledge of Cimabue's work was one of the components of Duccio's style at this time, but it was not the predominant, nor even the earliest influence; very probably Cimabue's influence was a late insertion into a personal style that had already evolved within the framework of the well-developed Sienese tradition. In the years between 1260 and 1280, largely due to the inspiration of its magnificent cathedral, Siena had emerged as one of the most vital centres of art in Italy. A remarkable successionof altarpieces by Sienese painters testifies to the simultaneous work of a number of artists, some of whom possessed quite distinct personalities. The variety of orientations of these painters shows that they did not work in provincial isolation but were sensitive to the diverse influences of the age, including Cimabue.
Duccio certainly studied these painters and was influenced by them. Notably evident in his style are the influence of the older painter Guido da Siena with the serene dignity of his figures, permeated by lyrical tenderness and grace, in the now-fading stylized postures of the Byzantine tradition, and of the master of the “St. John the Baptist Altarpiece” in the Pinacoteca Nazionale of Siena, with his complex Byzantine iconography and his vivid, dense colouring. Duccio was ableto draw from sources outside Siena as well: from the combination of linear stylization and Hellenistic types that characterized the illustrations of books imported from Constantinople and also from contemporary French Gothic miniatures, with their lively tone and lyrical, animated stylizations of clothing and gesture. Duccio may also have travelled to Florence in his early years, coming into contact with Cimabue, but such an explanation is not entirely necessary to account for the formation of his style. In fact, in Duccio's only certain work prior to the “Madonna Rucellai,” echoes of Cimabue are even less apparent than in the Rucellai altarpiece. The conclusion that Duccio was nothing more than a follower of Cimabue at the time he painted the “Madonna Rucellai” is implausible and overlooks the originality, as well as the excellence, of the work. If, in fact, he was in 1285 entrusted with a work of such significance at Florence, his reputation must have already been establishedand have spread beyond the confines of his native Siena.

Later commissions

Traces of Duccio's association with Cimabue remain in the large round stained-glass window of the choir of the Siena cathedral, for which Duccio made the designs. This work was commissioned between 1287 and 1288 and is the earliest known example of stained glass produced by an Italian.
Numerous documents attest to Duccio's action in Siena during the 20 years following the creation of the “Madonna Rucellai.” He was by now the leading painter of the city and as such executed in 1302 an altarpiece, now lost, for the altar of the chapel of the Palazzo Pubblico, the city hall. During this period, some unsigned and undocumented altarpieces appeared, and some of these are certainly Duccio's work; the most significant of these is a small altarpiece representing the Virgin enthroned with angels andcalled “The Madonna of the Franciscans” because of the three monks kneeling at the foot of the throne. In this work a developed Gothic style appears in the curving outlines, which give an exquisite decorative effect.

The work in which the genius of Duccio unfolds in all its brilliant fullness and the one to which the painter owes his greatest fame, however, is the “Maesta,” the altarpiece for the main altar of the cathedral of Siena. He was commissioned to do this work on Oct. 9, 1308, for a payment of 3,000 gold florins, the highest figure paid to an artist up to that time. On June 9, 1311, the whole populace of Siena, headed by the clergy and civil administration of the city, gathered at the artist's workshop to receive the finished masterpiece. They carried it in solemn procession to the accompaniment of drums and trumpets to the cathedral. For three days alms were distributed to the poor, and great feasts were held. Never before had the birth of a work of art been greeted with such public jubilation and never before had there been such immediate awareness that a work was truly a masterpiece and not just a reflection of the religious fervour of the people. Duccio himself was aware of the work's significance; he signed the throne of the Virgin with an invocation that was devout yet proud for the time: “Holy Mother of God, grant peace to Siena, and life to Duccio because he has painted you thus.”
The “Maesta” is in the form of a large horizontal rectangle, surmounted by pinnacles, and with a narrow horizontal panel, or predella, as its base. It is painted on both sides. The entire central rectangle of the front side is a single scene showing the Madonna and Child enthroned in the middle of a heavenly court of saints and angels with the four patron saints of Siena kneeling at their feet. The back is subdivided into 26 compartments that illustrate the Passion of Christ. The front and back of the predella contain scenes of the infancy and the ministry of Jesus, and the pinnacles, crowning the entire work, represent events after the Resurrection. In all, there are 59 narrative scenes.
The rigorous symmetry with which the groups of adoring figures at the sides of the Virgin are arranged in the imposing scene of the central panel is inspired by compositions of the Byzantine tradition and gives evidence of Duccio's keen architectural sensibility by its power to draw attention to the “Maestà” as the true focal point of the cathedral's spatial and structural organization. Like elements of a living architecture, the 30 figures, through the slightest of gestures and turnings of the head, are intimatelyrelated, their positions repeated to give a feeling of intense lyrical contemplation. The consonance of feeling that arises from this contemplation gives the facial features of each a distinct, spiritual beauty, reminiscent, especially the faces of the angels, of the more idealistic creations of Hellenistic art. The Madonna, slightly larger than the other figures, seated on a magnificent and massive throne of polychrome marbles, inclines her head gently as if trying to hear the prayer of the faithful. Duccio thus succeeds in reconciling perfectly the Byzantine ideal of power and dignity with the underlying tenderness and mysticism of the Sienese spirit. The scenes in the predella, pinnacles, and back are filled with the Byzantine iconographic schemes from which Duccio finds it difficult to detach himself, and they are developed with a deeper concern for their narrative significance. The scenes are not, however, merely descriptions or chronicles. They include many touches from daily life, which provide a lyrical synthesis that harmonizes the character and gestures of the figures with their landscape and architectural surroundings.

Last years

Only scanty bits of information are available about the few years that Duccio lived after the completion of the “Maesta.” He had a prosperous workshop from which other works emerged, but they seem to have been executed in great part by students. His financial condition must have been quite sound because by 1304 he bought a vineyard in the neighbourhood of Siena. Nevertheless, in 1313 he was once again deep in debt. At death he was survived by his wife, Taviana, and seven children. At least two of his children, Galgano and Giorgio, were painters, but nothing is known about their work or their merits. The identity of one of his direct followers is known, his nephew Segna di Buonaventura.

Enzo Carli (Encyclopaedia Britannica)