Gifted to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1970 (acc. no. 1971.44)

Stuart J. Fleming and Doreen Stoneham, "Thermoluminescent Authenticity Study and Dating of Renaissance Terracottas", in Archaeometry, vol. 15, no. 2, July, 1973, pp. 239-247
Lorenzo Lorenzi, Agnolo di Polo: scultura in terracotta dipinta nella Firenze di fine Quattrocento, Ferrara, 1998
John Goldsmith Phillips, "A Sculpture by Agnolo di Polo", in The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, New Series, vol. 30, no. 2, Oct. - Nov., 1971, pp. 80-93
Louis A. Waldman, "The Terracotta Sculptor Agnolo di Polo De' Vetri: the Prison, the Pievano, the Pratese, and the Cook", in Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz, Florence, 2007

Layers of polychromy refreshed throughout. Chips and losses throughout. Much of restoration was originally done, and is documented as having been done, by the artist including a break in the proper right wrist (hand now with wood replacement), repiared break through neck, and her proper right shoulder. Horizontal line through waist and below thighs probably indicates restoration and reassembly of separately fired sections of the sculpture as was the practice. Restored break to proper left foot and along lower border of drapery. Restoration to nose. Further restoration including mantle, left wrist, and horizontal crack below knees.
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The present figure of Mary Magdalene is one of the few extant documented works by Agnolo di Polo. He was a prolific sculptor working in Florence during the Renaissance whose name has been attached to a number of important works. This figure of the Magdalene was attributed at one time to Benedetto da Maiano but documentary evidence and stylistic comparison now allows scholars to confidently identify this figure as the Mary Magdalene which Agnolo made for the Ospedale della Morte in Pistoia in 1495.

Documents from the Pistoia archives published in 1905 by Peleo Bacci show that the officers of the Sapienza in Pistoia ordered a terracotta figure of Mary Magdalene to be made for the oratory attached to the Ospedale della Mort🦋e on August 16, 1495. These papers also show that Agnolo di Polo received a first payment to execute the figure on September 1st of that year, and a final payment the following month, on October 12th. A local master, Bernardino del 🐷Signoraccio, was paid to paint the figure on March 31, 1496.

In 1496, Charles VIII's troops returned to France after a largely unsuccessful campaign across Italy which included an invasion of Pistoia. Their withdrawal left the city unstable, and two prominent families struggled for control, dividing the city and throwing it into turmoil. This figure of Mary Magdalene suf🥃fered damage at this time and on June 23, 1498 it is described as being broken. A record in the city archives indicates that Agnolo was paid to repair the sculpture later that month, and again on April 26, 1500. This included the replacement of her right hand with one in wood. On April 8, 1503, it is recorded that the Ospedale paid for the materials to repaint and regild Agnolo's Magdalene and to secure her in a niche in t📖he building, probably high up on a wall or over a doorway as indicated by further expenditures to remove scaffolding at that time.

The present figure can be compared with two other documented works by Agnolo, a bust of Christ the Redeemer in the Museo Civico in Pistoia dated to 1498, and a group of figures in the Spadari Chapel in Santissima Annunziata in Arezzo, particularly the figure of Saint Roch, commissioned in 1526, shortly before the sculptor's death. These documented works are modelled with oval faces and high foreheads, placid expressions, as well as arched brows over heavyily lidded eyes centered by long, narrow noses. The drapery lies flat and is modelled with  large simple folds. A figure of Saint John the Evangelist in the Chiesa dello Spirito Santo in Pistoia with similar expression, hair, and drapery has been added to the artist's oeuvre (Lorenzi, op. cit.).

It has been noted that the present figure also bears a resemblance to the central female figure in Domenico Ghirlandaio's fresco of the Birth of the Baptist from the Tornabuoni chapel in Santa Maria Novella in Florence which was completed by 1490. The figures in the scene are modeled on fashionable 15th century Florentine women, and it has been proposed that this central figure can be identified as Maria Maddalena de' Medici, daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici, the nephew of Giovanni Tornabuoni who commissioned the fresco. Maria Maddalena would have been an appropriate inspiration for Agnolo's terracotta Magdalene (Phillips, op. cit.).

Agnolo di Polo came from a family of artists and apparently studied under Andrea Verrochio or Lorenzo di Credi who took over Verrochio's workshop when the master went to Venice toward the end of his life. Vasari writes that as a student of Verrochio, Agnolo became skilled and prodigious with clay sculpture. A number of painted terracotta sculptures from this period have been attributed to Agnolo's hand and his earlier work shows the influence of his time in Verrochio's workshop.

A Thermoluminescence Analysis Report from Oxford Authentication, Ltd. dated December 11, 2012, states that sample N112n5, taken from the present lot, was last fired between 400 and 700 years ago (1312-1612 AD).

RELATED LITERATURE
Bruce Boucher, Earth and Fire: Italian Terracotta Sculpture from Donatello to Canova, New Haven, 2002
Alan Darr, Italian Sculpture in the Detroit Institute of Arts, London, 2002
Lorenzo Lorenzi, Agnolo di Polo: scultura in terracotta dipinta nella Firenze di fine Quattrocento, Ferrara, 1998
Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Artists, trans. and reprinted London, 1965