Saint Luke and Saint Mark in marble - Italy 14th century

We find two splendid high reliefs representing Saint Luke and Saint Mark with their allegorical form of the tetramorph.
Luke is represented by a winged bull. We see him in profile, in a mid-length robe, holding an open book, called a missal. He appears to be writing on it, perhaps the Gospel. Beneath the book is the winged bull, his symbol. Note the inkwell he holds in his other hand at top right. Saint Luke was a physician and companion of Saint Paul. Traditionally, Luke is the patron saint of doctors, artists and sculptors.
We find Mark again, also in profile, but this time facing the other way. He is holding a book, more specifically, a missal, which he is consulting. In the same depiction, the winged lion that is his symbol is placed beneath the book. In the New Testament, Mark's Gospel is the shortest and oldest. It is said to be a source for the writing of Matthew's and Luke's Gospels.
As his Gospel begins with the preaching of St. John the Baptist in the desert, its symbol is the lion, the desert animal. This symbol represents courage and elevation. Mark is the patron saint of Venice. He is said to have died a martyr.
These two sculptures correspond to each other. He must originally have had the other two missing evangelists, Saint Matthew and Saint John.
The two high reliefs can be found in the sales catalog “The Clemente Collection”. A collector in late 19th-century Florence, we can see a photo of the works in the catalog listing his collection. They are numbered 474 and 473.
The New Testament consists mainly of the four Gospels. These texts were written by the four evangelists: Matthew, Luke, Mark and John. They are the only ones to have been canonized by the Christian churches. Most of the time, the four evangelists are portrayed in allegorical form, known as “tetramorphs”. Luke (the bull), Matthew (the eagle), John (the man) and Mark (the lion).
The sculptural style of the two high reliefs can be linked to the work of Giovanni Pisano, already attributed in the sales catalog.
Giovanni Pisano is considered one of Italy's greatest architects and sculptors. He followed in the footsteps of his father, Nicolas Pisano, the initiator of an Italian sculpture movement that abandoned Byzantine molds, with whom he became a collaborator. His sculptures constitute one of the most significant cycles in European Gothic sculpture. Our two high reliefs can be traced back to his style, probably to a member of his entourage.
Indeed, the evangelists is a subject that Pisano is also known for, with the example of St. Luke and St. Mark in the Museo Del Duomo in Pisa. Here we find the two evangelists, St. Luke and Mark, with their tetramorphic symbols depicted alongside. Although the arrangement of the elements is different, the sculptures as a whole are very similar. We also see the missal held by each saint.
The marble duo of St. Luke and St. Mark is an exceptional sculptural ensemble that responds to each other. Despite the absence of the last two evangelists, who must surely have been part of the pair, these two high reliefs display an artistic style similar to that of Giovanni Pisano's work, enabling us to attribute them to a sculptor of his entourage, as seen in the sale catalog “the Clemente collection”.