Vatican Museums

Towards the middle of the 1930s, Marino Marini began to dedicate himself to the subject that was to become a recurrent theme in his work: man on horseback. This very precious body of work by Marini, which entered the Vatican collections thanks to various donations, of which the most important was made by his wife Marina in 1989, demonstrates the gradual metamorphosis of the subject at the hand of the artist, both in sculpture and painting, throughout the years: from the Cavaliere in legno (1936-1937) to the Cavaliere (1953) and the L’idea del cavaliere (1955), from the Grido (1962) to the Miracolo (1971), versions close to abstraction, up to the painted Cavallo rosso (1953), Grido and La caduta dell’Angelo (both from 1963). His young works on paper, the small bronze Crocifisso (1936), the bas-relief Crocifissione (1939-1945) and implicitly the Giocoliere (1946) belong instead to the category of religious works.