Penitent Magdalene (Donatello)

The Penitent Magdalene is a wooden sculpture of Mary Magdalene by the Italian Renaissance sculptor Donatello, now usually dated to around 1440. The sculpture was probably commissioned for the Baptistery of Florence. The piece was received with astonishment for its unprecedented realism.

It is now in the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo in Florence. The wood used by Donatello is that of white poplar. Wood was still used for crucifixes for its lightness.

It was also non expensive and convenient for transporting long distances, and was usually painted. When a Florentine confraternity in Venice commissioned from Donatello a statue of John the Baptist, patron saint of Florence, still in the Frari Church there, wood was chosen. It was signed and dated 1438, and remains the only work by Donatello in the city; he usually did not sign his work, except for some commissions destined for outside Florence.

The revised dating of the Saint John had knock-on consequences for a far more celebrated wooden figure, the Penitent Magdalene long in the Florence Baptistery. This is "formidably expressive" in a stark style found in Donatello's last years, and had been dated to around 1456, or 1453–1455, until the date was found on the other figure; it is now dated generally to the late 1430s, or at any rate before Donatello went to Padua.