Studi di Storia dell'Arte 30
Liliana Barroero, Giovanna Capitelli, Stefano Casciu, Stefano Causa, Enrico Maria Dal Pozzolo, Cristina De Benedictis, Cristina Galassi, Gert Kreytenberg, Francesco Federico Mancini, Enrica Neri Lusanna, Steffi Roettgen,
Pietro Ruschi, Erich Schleier, Nicolas Schwed, Angelo Tartuferi, Anchise Tempestini.
Marcello Castrichini direttore responsabile
Il Maestro della Sant’Agata in San Miniato al Monte a Firenze e un punto di vista su Francesco da Pisa
The Master of the Sant’Agata
at San Miniato al Monte in Florence
and a point of view on Francesco
da Pisa
The so-called Master of the Saint Agatha, from the panel depicting the homonymous saint preserved in the Museum of the Opera of the Duomo of Florence, was one of the leading figures of Florentine painting in the second half of the thirteenth century. Starting from the analysis of the important contribution made by this artist in the decorative yard of the church of San Miniato al Monte in Florence, the essay offers a review of his production and, in addition to confirming in his catalogue the impressive mosaic in the apse of the famous Florentine church, proposes to recognize in the paintings attributed so far to the so-called "Master of the Crucifix of San Miniato" the works belonging to the final phase of his activity. The Florentine mosaic appears stylistically quite different from that in the apse of the Cathedral of Pisa, and in particular from the central figure with the blessing Christ, which was executed according to the documents by "Magister Franciscus", inhabitant in the same city. The present contribution denies on the basis of stylistic evidence any involvement of Francesco da Pisa in the execution of some of the major Florentine mosaic cycles of the last thirteenth century (San Miniato al Monte, part of the scenes of the vault of the Baptistery and the lunette with the Coronation of the Virgin in the inner façade of the Florentine cathedral) supported by some critics in recent years.
Anna Rosa Calderoni Masetti
Riflettendo sull‘attività di Giovanni Pisano a Genova
The collections of Genoa or coming from Genoa, public and private, preserve some marble figures and heads that can be ascribed, on stylistic basis, to the late industriousness of Giovanni Pisano and his workshop. It cannot be ruled out that they were part of the funerary monument erected in St. Francis of Castelletto for Margherita of Brabante, wife of Emperor Arrigo VII, but not even that they were made for other sculptural organisms destined for the same city.
Among them, the Madonnina of this same artist exposed in the Museum of St. Augustine in Genoa, which, in parallel with the similar figure exhibited in the National Museum of St. Matthew in Pisa, is placed here in the center of an altar, probably that of the Empress’s tomb in the church of St. Francis in Castelletto. For both sculptures, the reference is to the marble altarpiece by Tommaso Pisano in the church of St. Francis in Pisa and to the dismembered altarpiece by Giovanni di Balduccio for the Capella Magna of the fortress of Porta Galliera in Bologna.
The second fragment examined is a female head in a bad but still legible state, preserved in a private Umbrian collection but coming from Genoa; despite the extensive mutilations suffered and its exposure to fire that has abraded and calcined the surfaces during an aerial bombardment, his headgear allows to identify it, albeit with caution, with the figure of a Fortress.
The third work analysed is the erected statue of an Apostle attributed to Lupo di Francesco or Bonaiuto di Michele, now in the Boston Museum but coming from a villa on the French Riviera, which is identified with that of an Evangelist, following the example of one of the images located at the base of the pulpit in the cathedral of Pisa; as is well known, these artists often sculpted their works on the example of Giovanni Pisano’s prototypes.
Gert Kreytenberg
Due frammenti di statue di una Adorazione dei Re Magi di Gano di Fazio
According to the comparisons with the works of the Sienese sculptor Gano di Fazio, it is possible to attribute to him the half figure in marble unknown until now, datable the beginning of the fourteenth century. The attribute, a cup with a lead, suggests the figure’s identification with one of the Three Wise Men. The fact he still hold in his hands his gift and he has beard, provides a lead towards Baldassarre, the medium of the wise men. A half figure similar in terms of hight representing a young man clean shaved, preserved in the Skulpturengalerie of the Staatliche Museen in Berlin, generally is known as a work of Gano di Fazio; also this one has a cup with a lead as attribute and it is identified as Saint Maria Maddalena or Saint Galgano. The congruencies between the two figures in accordance with the style, the measures and the attribute suggest a common contest that consist in a sculptural group belonging to an Adoration of the Tree Wise Men. The Berlin figure, thus, represents Gasparre, the youngest of the three. The model for this group that was not made by half figures, but by complete figures, that has to be taken into account, without doubts, is the Adoration of the Three Wise Men of Arnolfo di Cambio located in Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, realized approximately in 1290.
Mauro Minardi
Per la ricomposizione e la provenienza di un trittichetto del Maestro di Forlì
Toward the Reconstruction and the Provenance of a Small Triptych by the Master of Forlì
Technical investigation carried out on the supports of a series of small panels scattered in different museums and collections confirms the hypothesis proposed by Miklós Boskovits in 1990, and then set aside by scholarship, regarding their origin as fragments of a small triptych with movable shutters. This article provides an analysis of the particular characteristics of the supports of these paintings and focuses on the common collecting history of a part of them. On the basis of the peculiar iconographical features visible in the work here reconstructed, the article also addresses the question of its original destination: the painting perhaps comes from the city of Forlì and was probably intended for the private devotion of a nun belonging to the order of the Poor Clares. Lastly, the triptych is discussed in the framework of the career and the singular stylistic tendencies followed by the Master of Forlì, a painter active in Romagna at the turn of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and its date in the early years of the Trecento is specified.
Laura Alidori Battaglia e Marco Battaglia
L’impresa trecentesca degli antifonari della Santissima Annunziata Magister Petrus miniatore pisano a Firenze ed una proposta per l’identità del Maestro delle Effigi Domenicane
A re-analysis of the payment records for the production of the XIV century antiphonaries for the Servites of Santa Maria dell'Annunziata of Florence and the discovery of the name of magister Petrus in an unpublished document are the starting points of this study. These identify the "magister Petrus", not as the Bolognese 1328 Master as previously proposed, but as an artist born in Pisa and established in Florence already in 1330, responsible for the decoration of the antiphonary P in 1333.
Given this identification, we further deduce the name of the Master of the Dominican Effigies, who paints an initial in the antiphonary H, as "ser Banco", an artist mentioned in the documents of the Annunziata in 1332 and in a payment record for the Compagnia of San Zanobi in 1352.
Furthermore, the activity of the Master of the Dominican Effigies seems to overlap both geographically and chronologically with newly found documentary records of ser Banco Troncolini, chaplain in the convent of San Pier Maggiore and then rector of the church of San Simone. Although we could not yet find documentary evidence that the priest of San Pier Maggiore was a painter and illuminator, based on the results of the analysis of the archival documents and of the identified works of our artist, we suggest the hypothesis that ser Banco, alias Master of the Dominican Effigies, could indeed be Banco Troncolini.
Helena Giommoni
L’arca-altare di San Donato tra Arezzo e Firenze
Just before the fall into the hands of the Florentine enemy in 1384, Arezzo confirmed for the last time its power and independence through the construction approximately between 1362 and 1375 of the most sumptuous and magnificent monument for the city saint patron: Saint Donatus Arch-altar. The marbel reliquary combines all the feature of Arezzo's artistic culture in the second half of the 14th century, which show its strong relations with Florence, as demonstrated by the presence in the construction site of sculptors like Betto di Francesco da Firenze, at whom side is mentioned a Giovanni di Francesco da Arezzo. My work focuses on the latter, still today of uncertain definition, in order to prove his identity with Giovanni Fetti da Firenze, the sculptor of reliefs of the Porta dei Canonici in the Cathedral of Florence, in accordance with some insights of Gert Kreytenberg and in opposition to the most recent hypothesis of Aldo Galli.
Marcello Castrichini
Francesco I Gonzaga con Gianfrancesco nel Torneo-Battaglia di Pisanello in Palazzo Ducale di Mantova
In 1991-1996, about 25 years after Pisanello's fresco cycle was discovered and detached from the Ducal Palace of Mantua, a restoration project was planned by Aldo Cicinelli, the then Head of the city's Artistic Heritage Office, and carried out in cooperation with the architect Robero Soggia, who later became the site manager. The restoration involved repositioning the parts of the frescoes at their original heights. It also aimed to find solutions to matters that at the time were yet unresolved and that compromised the appreciation of this major fresco, a turning point in the courtly International Gothic style. The results achieved, which were published in 1996, were considerable in number and importance, such as understanding the technique used and mapping out each giornata, or day's work, of the fresco for the first time. It successfully established that the red under-paintings, while very detailed, were designed to be covered by frescoes, of which previously made fragments were found. The client was also identified as Gianfrancesco Gonzaga (until then, uncertainly identified as his brother Ludovico), who is painted in the battle-joust with his name inscribed on the horse's caparison along with the symbols of his leadership. Another 30 years later, studies of the material collected during that restoration have also revealed the figure of his father, Francesco I Gonzaga, placed at the centre of the fray as the pivotal figure of the battle-joust scene. As with Gianfrancesco, this knight was able to be identified due to the name Francesco inscribed on his horse's bridle and caparison. This therefore confirms that the Arthurian fresco cycle in Mantua was no less than the moment of triumph for the house of Gonzaga at the time of Gianfrancesco, the client, who also attributes the merit to his father, Francesco I. Also being published, for the first time, are some details of the battle-joust following the 1996 restoration.
Ada Labriola
Un codice con le Elegiae di Properzio appartenuto a Matteo Luigi Canonici e alcune proposte per la biblioteca di Lorenzo e Giovanni di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici
This essay aims to advance some new proposals on an illuminated manuscript of the Elegies by Propertius, focusing on its original provenance in fifteenth century Florence (Oxford, Bodleian Library, Canon.Class.Lat. 31). At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the codex belonged to the famous Venetian bibliophile Matteo Luigi Canonici (1727-1805), who had acquired it from the library of the Guadagni family, owners of one of the largest Florentine book collections. In 1817, after Canonici’s death, his library was sold to Oxford University, and entered the Bodleian Library.
Scholars have rightly attributed the miniatures in the Bodleian Elegies to Gherardo di Giovanni, the most refined Florentine illuminator of the last quarter of the fifteenth century. On the other hand, philological studies of Propertius’ poem in the manuscript tradition have suggested that the Oxford copy was produced in the 1480s. On the frontispiece, the codex shows the Medici family coat of arms, without the blue fleur de lis ball, a privilege granted in 1465 by King Louis XI de Valois to Piero di Cosimo de’ Medici (d. 1469), and inherited by his sons Lorenzo the Magnificent and Giuliano. In many of the illuminated initials, the dominant theme is represented by fire and flames, which do not appear to be connected to Lorenzo the Magnificent or his brother Gliuliano. Fire and flames were in fact devices of their cousins in the secondary branch of the family, Lorenzo and Giovanni di Pierfrancesco de’ Medici. These brothers were important patrons and book collectors. They had received a sophisticated humanistic training by intellectuals like Giorgio Antonio Vespucci, Angelo Poliziano and Marsilio Ficino. In this essay an interesting group of Medicean illuminated manuscripts and incunabula - preserved in Florentine, European and American libraries - will be linked for the first time to the Oxford Propertius and referred to Lorenzo and Giovanni’s patronage.
Nicoletta Pons
Una nuova pala d’altare di Jacopo del Sellaio
In this article, a new altarpiece by Jacopo del Sellaio, Coronation of Mary in the Galleria Palatina Deposit in Florence is presented. Stylistic connections to other Sellaio’s paintings and to the Botticelli Coronation for San Marco church help to date the altarpiece around 1490. The representation of Saint Apollonia, Saint
Benedict, Saint Andrew, Saint Zanobi, Saint Romualdo e Saint John the Baptist in the painting suggest not only a Florentine provenance but also a Benedictine origin. In particular, the presence of Saint Apollonia in a privileged position at the right of the Virgin could suggest a provenance by the Sant’Apollonia monastery in Florence or by a building tied and connected to it, like Santa Maria a Mantignano or a lost oratory in the San Frediano quarter. The painting shows strict iconographic connections with many examples of the same theme by Neri di Bicci, who also painted a now lost coronation for the Sant’Apollonia monastery, which could have been a model for the Sellaio altarpiece.
Christopher Daly
Una proposta per una predella del Sellaio
This article proposes that three panels now in various collections were once part of five-part predella by Jacopo del Sellaio. The iconography of the predella allows the author to suggest a provenance from a Franciscan church, perhaps in the painter’s resident quarter of Florence, the Oltrarno. The article also puts forth some new additions to Sellaio’s catalogue, including what is probably a fourth fragment from his altarpiece for the Compagnia del Poponcino in S. Maria del Carmine, Florence.
Sara Cavatorti
I Crocifissi lignei di Nero Alberti da Sansepolcro nelle Marche
Romano Alberti, known as Nero, made two wooden crucifixes during his career: the works are preserved in the church of the Madonna delle Grazie in Sansepolcro (1524) and in the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie al Rivaio in Castiglion Fiorentino (1561-1562). On the basis of these carvings, the article proposes the attribution to Nero of other wooden crucifixes present in the Marche (Sant’Angelo in Vado, Jesi, Cagli) and highlights the fundamental role of the sculptor’s workshop.
Chiara Violini
Pordenone in Umbria: il caso di Alviano
The passage of the Giovanni Antonio da Pordenone in Umbria is testified by the fresco with the Madonna and Saints in the parish church of Alviano and by a more neglected cycle of friezes in the castle of the city. As the studies have pointed out on several occasions, the painting in the church shows the painter's updating on the Roman language he evidently acquired during his hypothetical journey in the city. This contribution proposes a double stage for the Roman update of Giovanni Antonio de’ Sacchis, called Pordenone, through new elements emerged from the comparative study of the fresco of the parish church and the group of friezes of the fortress, never before investigated in depth. The friezes are also examined in detail through the rediscovery of the mottos contained in them, which must be understood as a celebration of Bartolomeo d'Alviano and a hope for the renovation of his exploits throughout his gens. Starting from the reading of the elements of the friezes, a proposal is made here for the dating of the cycle around 1518-1519, while for the fresco, of which a new interpretation is proposed in this study, the date of 1516 is reconsidered, thus postulating a double stay of the artist in Central Italy, as already suggested by Giuseppe Fiocco and other scholars. A reconsideration of the relationship between Bartolomeo d'Alviano and the humanists gravitating around the Accademia Liviana founded by him is also carried out in order to better understand the decorative program of the friezes of the castle.
Maria Rosa
Pizzoni
Un’Annunciazione di Francesco
Salviati per L’Aquila.
Notizie storiografiche e documentarie
An Annunciation by Francesco Salviati
for L'Aquila. Historiography and documentation
The
objective of the article is to reconstruct the history of a painting
by Francesco Salviati, which could be found in L'Aquila up to the
beginning of the nineteenth century, but which is today considered
lost. The work, which depicts the Annunciation and adorned the high
altar of the Church of the Annunciation, was removed in the early
decades of the nineteenth century to disappear without trace. The
information provided in this paper suggests that the altarpiece of
Salviati, once found in L'Aquila, could be, in fact, a painting by
the artist in the church of San Giovanni Maggiore in Naples and
whose origin is unknown.
Sonia
Cavicchioli
I fregi dipinti in palazzo Leoni: Lorenzo
Sabatini e il mito di Enea nella Bologna del Cinquecento
One of the most interesting interior
decorations in XVIth-century Bologna can be seen in two rooms at the
first floor of the Leoni Palace, each frescoed with a frieze (a
peculiar artistic genre that flourished in Rome and Bologna) devoted
to the ancient Trojan hero Aeneas. This article aims to study the
decoration from the stylistic and iconographical point of view.
Through the formal analysis of the friezes, composed of an
architectural frame and narrative scenes, on one hand the Author
shows their strong relationship with Nicolò dell’Abate’s
masterpieces, painted in Bologna between 1548 and 1552, and on the
other demonstrates that Leoni Palace decoration inspired the friezes
painted by the Carracci some decades later, at the beginning of the
1590s. The study of their style brings to attribute them to a
Bolognese artist who painted both in Bologna, and in Florence and
Rome, Lorenzo Sabatini: the article gives evidence of this,
comparing the likeness of compositions, representation of space and
buildings, and pictorial handling of human figures. It also examines
the friezes as a narrative decoration, able to satisfy the patron’s
and contemporary public’s expectations. An illustration of Aeneas’s
flee from Troy and of his love with Dido, the friezes follow the
verses of the Latin poem by Virgil, which the humanists read and
interpreted as a moral speculum for rulers and men of power. The
article reflects on the reception of the classic text in Renaissance
Bologna and proposes an interpretation of the friezes.
Federica
Mancini
Dello “schiccherar sulla carta” di
Giovanni Domenico Cappellino.Proposte per
l’attività grafica del miglior seguace di Giovanni Battista Paggi
On Giovanni Domenico Cappellino’s
‘schiccherar sulla carta’: propositions on the graphic works of the
favorite Giovanni Battista Paggi’s pupil.
Raffaello Soprani, the biographer of the
Genoese artists, wrote in his Vite in 1674, that Cappellino was
Paggi’s favorite pupil. Although he mostly described his
handsomeness and his obsession for cleanness, he gave some
indications about Cappellino’s painting. He was far less interested
in describing his being a draftsman. Soprani wrote that Cappellino
joined Paggi’s workshop and that he soon became the best scholar in
drawing from real, in making copies from the masters and in
inventing his own compositions. Even if there are some thirty sheets
attributed to him, no overviewing analysis of all these propositions
has been tried sofar. The aim of this article is to give a critical
view, as far as possible, of his graphic works, summing up the
drawings attributed to Cappellino from the end of Sixties up today.
Thanks to the research started and conducted over years by Ms. Mary
Newcome Schleier, other Genoese art historians have added new
drawings. We deliver here the result of our study, publishing some
new graphic works and as many reproductions as possible to let the
reader understand Cappellino’s style evolution. The analysis
comprises also three lists at the end of the essay, the first about
the originals, the second mentioning the works ‘after’ Cappellino
and the third concerning the ‘rejected’ drawings.
Alessandro Brogi
Lucio
Massari, Ludovico Carracci, Annibale Carracci. Spigolature
L’intervento costituisce una sorta di
integrazione agli ‘Addenda’ pubblicati nel 2016 dall’autore, che
coglie l’occasione per alcune precisazioni e per presentare un paio
di inediti emersi sul mercato a libro chiuso: uno riferibile a Lucio
Massari, di cui si conosceva copia segnalata nel volume citato, e
uno di Ludovico stesso, un pregevole Ecce Homo assegnabile alla fase
tarda del grande artista.
The article represents a sort of integration
to the “Addenda’ published by the author in 2016.
The speech has
been also the occasion for doing some clarifications and for showing
a couple of unknow paintings emerged on the market after the book
had been edited.
The first one is referable to Lucio Massari of
whom a copy was illustrated in the above mentioned book, the second
refers to Ludovico himself, a remarkable Ecce Homo dating to the
later phase of the artist.
Massimo Moretti
Gli anni romani di Jacques Stella
(1622-1634) e due nuovi suoi quadri per la Cattedrale di Amelia al tempo
del vescovo Domenico Pichi (1623-1633)
A few years ago, two important long-forgotten
paintings representing the Annunciation of Mary and the Adoration of
the Shepherds were found in a depot of the cathedral of Amelia. The
two paintings, coming from the chapel dedicated to the Assumption in
the same cathedral, had already been attributed to the Florentine
painter Pompeo Caccini. Following the discovery of the date (1628)
and signature of the French painter Jacques Stella during a skillful
restoration of the Annunciation, the present research assigns both
canvases to Stella, whose long activity in Rome has been examined as
well. The canvases are then traced back to the commission of the
bishop of Amelia Domenico Pichi, a personality linked to the
Barberini court and particularly attentive to the contemporary
artistic environment.
Erich Schleier
Il vero “Apollo che abbraccia un’
arbore della mano del S. Muti”e alcune considerazioni su Charles Mellin
In 1996 I published a picture depicting a
half- length figure of Apollo, which had been on the Roman market in
1973/74 (now Paris, Motais de Narbonne collection). I identified it
with a picture by S.(Giov.Batt.)Muti, inventarised among the
holdings of Cardinal Francesco Barberini under August 4 1627 and
described as "Apollo che abbraccia un arbore". I also stated that
the picture was largely executed by Charles Mellin, probably Muti's
teacher. This was accepted by all later scholars, including D.
Jacquot (catalogue of the Motais de Narbonne collection, Orleans
2018).While this picture is a masterpiece by Charles Mellin of his
earlier, Vouetesque phase of ca. 1625-27, the identification with
the painting by S. Muti, mentioned in the Barberini inventory, can
no longer be upheld, also because the Apollo in the Motais picture
does not really embrace a tree (into which Daphne had been
transformed).The real picture by S. Muti of Apollo, who embraces a
tree, surfaced in 2017. It came from the Corsini collection in
Florence and can be identified with a picture listed in the post
mortem inventory (1911) of Anna Corsini Barberini, as the number in
the lower right proves. The picture was shown in Maastricht in 2018
by Alessandro Orsi, who sold it to a private client. The picture
shows no influence of Mellin, but some affinities with the "David"
by Gianlorenzo Bernini of 1624 (Rome, Gallerie Nazionali d' Arte
Antica, Palazzo Barberini).
Another painting by Charles Mellin of
his mature phase of ca. 1630 is published here: a bust length
depiction of a young male Saint of unknown identity. It was shown in
2015 in Maastricht by Paul Smeets (now Paris, private collection).
The attribution, first suggested by the present writer, was
confirmed by Philippe Malgouyres, the best expert of Mellin.
Furthermore a small tondo (26,5 cm on panel) of a head of a young
girl as St. Catherine of Alexandria, which had been sold in Paris in
2017 as "école française vers 1650 entourage d' Aubin Vouet" is here
proposed as a work by Mellin.
Finally a number of pictures
recently attributed to Mellin, are here rejected as such: four
pictures published by Y. Primarosa in 2012 and 2017, three of which
had already been rejected by Malgouyres in 2016. The fourth was
published by Primarosa in 2017(Lamentation of Jacob over the bloody
vestment of Joseph).
Furthermore the attribution to Mellin as
head of an equipe of painters of the ceiling frescoes in nine rooms
of the piano nobile in the Villa Sforza ai Quattro Cantoni in Rome
(published by L. Calenne in July 2019) is here rejected.
Fausto Nicolai
Nuovi documenti sulla genesi
seicentesca di San Martino al Cimino.
Virgilio Spada e i Pamphilj
The article introduces new documents
about the Baroque genesis of the town of San Martino al Cimino, and
points out the essential contribution provided by Virgilio Spada
(DATE) to the development of its urban plan. As advisor for the arts
and amateur architect at the court of the Pamphilj family, Virgilio
Spada elaborated an original plan which turned the medieval village
of San Martino into a modern 17th century town. The new city plan
was based on contemporary artistic theories and influenced by his
close friend Francesco Borromini’s architectural experience,
revealing the town of San Martino as a perfect example of Baroque
design.
Maria Stella
Alfonsi
Da Venezia a Firenze. Da fratello a
fratello.Note su alcuni
passaggi di proprietà fra Paolo del Sera, Giovan Carlo e Leopoldo de'
Medici
This essay retraces some events of
the Medici collections into several and different archival sources –
correspondence, inventories, notarial deeds. The massive sale of the
Venetian picture gallery of Paolo del Sera in 1654 brought to
Florence more than seventy paintings, to be divided between the two
cadet brothers of Medici house, Leopoldo and Giovan Carlo. Dynamics
of this acquisition and the division of the works between the two
purchasers have been lighted up through unpublished documentation.
Tracing back the flows of Del Sera’s sale, the essay suggests to
identify both dispersed paintings and works that are still part of
the Uffizi collection in Florence, anticipating the date of entry
into the Medici collections. A comparison with several inventories
has permitted as well to recognize paintings from the Uffizi
galleries whose origin was unknown, while others have been found to
move among different family collections.
Francesca Baldassari
Per Orazio Fidani: aggiunte al suo
catalogo
The article examines and discusses
five unpublished paintings by the florentine painter Orazio Fidani
(1610-1656), a pupil and assistant of Giovanni Bilivert, whose
manner is reflected in all his work.
The canvas with Miriam di
Penta Fine Arts (Rome) shows a young man who looks at himself in the
mirror and who carries a shrunken heart on the plate of his head.
The painting, datable for stylistic reasons to about 1645, is
supposed to illustrate a singular parable of Jewish origin which
invites men to consider others so as not to harden. Fidani’s oeuvre
is also enriched by a large painting, privately-owned, depicting the
Abduction of Helen that casts new light on his profane production.
Thanks to his narrative paintings treating mythological themes
related to love, like The Abduction of Helen here proposed, the
artist enjoyed considerable fame in Florence in his own day. A Saint
Catherine, a work for private devotion, is a fine example of his
half- lenght figure that satisfied the varied tastes of Fidani’s
collectors and patrons. The close resemblances to the allegorical
figures painted by Fidani in the 1650 enable to recognise it as a
late work of the artist. Fidani is also credited with the autorship
of two other religious paintings: the Deposition of Christ in a
private collection and the canvas representing Mary’s Immaculate
Conception, originally in the church of Santa Croce in Florence.
Despite the prestigious location, Mary’s Immaculate Conception seems
in every way less ambitious and even staid.
Gabriele
Capecchi
L’altro Volterrano. Due allestimenti di
Baldassarre Franceschini per la Basilica della Santissima Annunziata a
Firenze
Baldassarre Franceschini ruled over
florentine painting from 1636 to the death, working into the
Medicean court as for many noble houses, but largely unknown is the
graphic production acting from architecture to furniture design.
Amongst merge the studies about the Blessed Virgin tempietto at
Florentine Santissima Annunziata, namely the small bulb cupola,
enriched by mystical symbolism. Closed in 1673, the wooden structure
exhibits many references from prince Mattias’ funeral pomp, planned
by Volterrano in 1667.
The artist played a decisive role in
building a huge scaffold after 1677, really essential to fresco the
Renaissance dome in the same church. Filippo Baldinucci refers to an
umbrella-shaped frame, based on two overlapping sets and free
rotating the top from the lower one.
Indice dei nomi
e dei luoghi