Magnificence of marble. Bartolomé Ordóñez and Diego de Silóe ; sculpture of the Renaissance in Naples.

In only a few years, between 1513 and 1518, Bartolomé Ordóñez and de Siloe transformed Naples into one of the great European capitals of sculpture, bringing the treatment of marble into an unprecedented flower. The aristocracy considered Carrara marble, long-lasting and evocative of a Classical past, the material best suited to represent their ‘magnificence’. Ordóñez and de Siloe developed their art between Florence and Rome, in contact with Donatello, Michelangelo, Andrea Sansovino and Raphael. The two ‘eagles’ from Burgos created a particularly expressive style, in which the influence of models from the Italian Renaissance fused with that of Antiquity. The works of these two great sculptors were to prove decisive in the dissemination of the Renaissance in Spain.