Jacopo della Quercia was an Italian sculptor of the Italian Renaissance, a contemporary of Brunelleschi, Ghiberti and Donatello. He is considered a precursor of Michelangelo.
Jacopo della Quercia takes his name from Quercia Grossa (now Quercegrossa), a place near Siena, where he was born in 1374. He received his early training from his father, Piero d'Angelo, a woodcarver and goldsmith. Jacopo della Quercia, a Sienese, must have seen the works of Nicola Pisano and Arnolfo di Cambio on the pulpit in the cathedral of Siena and this must have influenced him. His first work may have been at the age of sixteen, an equestrian wooden statue for the funeral of Azzo Ubaldini. In 1386 he and his father moved to Lucca, owing to party strife and disturbances.
It is likely that della Quercia studied the huge collection of Roman sculptures and sarcophagi in the Camposanto in Pisa. These and later influences made him a transitional figure in the history of European art; his work shows a pronounced midcareer shift from the Gothic style to that of the Italian Renaissance. As in the case of Ghiberti, this development probably results from exposure to his contemporary, Donatello.
Della Quercia's earliest work (though this attribution is sometimes contested) appears in the Lucca cathedral: Man of Sorrows (Altar of the Sacrament) and a relief on the tomb of St. Aniello. In 1401 he entered a competition to design the bronze doors for Florence's Baptistery, but lost to Ghiberti. The unsuccessful entry's whereabouts are unknown.
In 1403 he sculpted the marble Virgin and Child for the Ferrara cathedral. Another (possible) work from his period in Ferrara is the statuette of St. Maurelius (both on in display in the Museo del Duomo).
Back again in Lucca in 1406, he received the commission from the city's ruler, Paolo Guinigi, to begin work at the tomb of his second wife Ilaria del Carretto in the Lucca cathedral. The richly dressed woman rests on top of the sarcophagus, delicately portrayed in a Gothic fashion, with her dog, symbol of conjugate fidelity, at her feet. But his use of several nude putti at the flanks of the tomb clearly shows the classical influence of the Roman sarcophagi at Camposanto (Pisa). This is a first, a harbinger of the incipient Renaissance.
In 1406 he was asked to build a new fountain in the Piazza del Campo in Siena. It had to replace the original fountain with a statue of the goddess Venus. This pagan statue was blamed for an outbreak of the Black Plague. The statue was destroyed and buried outside the city walls to avert its "evil influence". This prestigious commission shows that he was already being recognized as Siena's most prominent sculptor. The rectangular fountain, built in white marble, was dedicated to the Virgin, adorned on the three sides by many statues and multiple spouts. Because he accepted also other commissions at the same time, progress was slow. He started in 1414 and the fountain was only finished in 1419. He carved the panels in the workshop for sculptors, next to the cathedral. This workshop is now converted into the Cathedral Museum. It was called Fonte Gaia, because of the joy and the festivities when it was brought into operation. It is now a center of attraction for the many tourists. The old statues were replaced by copies in 1858 from Tito Sarrocchi and are now on display in the lower levels at Santa Maria della Scala.
In 1412, contracted by a wealthy merchant Lorenzo Trenta, he started the design of the Trenta Chapel in the basilica of San Frediano in Lucca. In 1413 he was accused, together with his assistant Giovanni da Imola, of serious crimes: theft, as well as rape and sodomy of one Clara Sembrini. He fled to Siena (and began working on the Fonte Gaia), but his assistant was incarcerated for three years. Jacopo della Quercia only would return to Lucca in March 1416, given a letter of safe conduct. He continued at the Trenta Chapel on the marble altar and several statues of saints, contained in niches. Some work was also performed by his assistant. Jacopo also designed the tomb slabs of Lorenzo Trenta and his wife Isabetta Onesti, on the pavement in front of the altar.
When in 1416 Lorenzo Ghiberti was asked to design a hexagonal basin with bronze panel for the Baptistery in Siena, political infighting brought Jacopo della Quercia into the project (who had been his competitor for the bronze doors in Florence). He only completed one bronze relief The Annunciation to Zacharias because he was working at the same time on the Fonte Gaia and the Trenta Chapel. His lingering on this project brought him in legal difficulties with the authorities. Since he had been rejected in the competition for the "Doors of Paradise" in Florence, he had been reluctant to work with bronze. And when he worked on the tabernacle of the baptistery, he insisted on taking care only of the marble part.

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