Putto in Spring

This putto  is my Raphael/Donatello, although I am in no way comparing my work to that of the masters. I just wanted to master the “M” setting on my Nikon D5100 to hopefully accomplish detail AND the bokeh you see in the background.

My putto sits on a pedestal in front of a lilac bush in my front yard. The head on this angelic garden statue is about the size of a baseball and the little bird is about 1 inch long.

Just so you don’t have to Google the word putto, Wikipedia defines it as: a figure in a work of art depicted as a chubby male child, usually nude and sometimes winged. Putti are distinct from cherubim. In the plural, “the Cherubim” refers to the biblical angels. While “cherubs” represent the second order of angels,^[2] putti are secular and present a non-religious passion.^[3] However, in the Baroque period of art, the putto came to represent the omnipresence of God.^[3] A putto representing a cupid is also called an amorino (plural amorini).

The Encyclopedia Britannica defines it as: a nude, chubby child figure, often with wings, frequently appearing in both mythological and religious paintings and sculpture, especially of the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Derived from personifications of love, or Eros figures, in Greek and Roman art, putti came to be used to portray cherubim in Italian paintings of the 15th century, especially those of the Madonna and Child. With the revival of classical mythological subjects in the late 15th century, Cupid was commonly represented as a putto, and numbers of anonymous putti were frequently depicted in attendance on various immortals.

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