Fra Bartolomeo
Fra Bartolomeo | |
---|---|
Savignano di Prato, Tuscany | |
Died | 31 October 1517 (aged 45) |
Fra Bartolomeo or Bartolommeo
He was instructed to resume painting for the benefit of his order in 1504, and then developed an idealized High Renaissance style, seen in his Vision of St Bernard of that year, now in poor condition but whose "figures and drapery move with a seraphic grace that must have struck the young Raphael with the force of revelation".[4] He remained friends with Raphael, and each influenced the other.
His portrait of Savonarola remains the best known image of the reformer. Fra Bartolomeo painted both in oils and fresco, and some of his drawings are pure landscape sketches that are the earliest of this type from any Italian artist.
Life
He was born in
Starting from 1483 or 1484, by recommendation of
He renounced painting for several years, not resuming until 1504 when he became the head of the monastery workshop in obedience to his superior. In that year he began a Vision of St. Bernard for Bernardo Bianco's family chapel in the Badia Fiorentina, finished in 1507. Soon thereafter, Raphael visited Florence and befriended the friar. Bartolomeo learned perspective from the younger artist, while Raphael added skills in coloring and handling of drapery, which was noticeable in the works he produced after their meeting. With Raphael, he remained on the friendliest terms, and when he departed from Rome, left in his hands two unfinished pictures which Raphael completed.[1]
At the beginning of 1508, Bartolomeo moved to
In 1513, he went to Rome, where he painted a Peter and Paul, now in the
He died in Florence in 1517.
Works
Style
Initially, his works showed the influence of Rosselli's assistant, Piero di Cosimo, and those of Domenico Ghirlandaio and Filippino Lippi. After his hiatus from 1500 to 1503, he seemed to change vision, taking from Raphael the representation of light and its effects over moving shapes.
Fra Bartolomeo's figures are generally small and draped. These qualities were alleged against him as defects, and to prove that his style was not the result of want of power, he painted the magnificent figure of the St Mark Evangelist (ranked as his masterpiece), and the undraped figure of Saint Sebastian. It is alleged that the latter was felt to be so strongly expressive of suffering and agony, that it was found necessary to remove it from the place where it had been exhibited in the chapel of a convent.[1]
Fra Bartolomeo's compositions are remarkable for skill in the massing of light and shade, richness and delicacy of colouring, and for the admirable drapery of the figures, Bartolomeo having been the first to introduce and use the lay-figure with joints.[1]
Among his pupils were Cecchino del Frate, Benedetto Ciamfanini, Gabriel Rustici,
Pieces
- Assumption of Mary (1508) - Oil on canvas, Kaiser – Friedrich – Museum, Berlin (destroyed in 1945)
- Madonna in Glory with Saints (1512, with Albertinelli) - Oil on canvas, Cathedral of Besançon
- Holy Conversation (1512) - Oil on canvas,
- Christ Supported by Two Angels (c. 1514) - Oil on canvas, Casa Vasari, Arezzo
- St. Sebastian (1515) - Oil on canvas, Alaffre Collection, Pézenas, France
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Scene with Christ in the Temple (1516), Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
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Madonna in Glory with Saints, Besançon Cathedral
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God the Father with Sts Catherine of Siena and Mary Magdalene, National Museum of Villa Guinigi
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Christ Crowned with Thorns
Notes
- Bartolommeo".
References
- ^ a b c d Chisholm 1911, p. 451.
- ^ a b Baynes 1878, p. 194.
- OCLC 11814265.
- ^ Hartt 1987, p. 477.
- ^ Vasari, Vite, Terza Parte.
Sources
- Baynes, T. S., ed. (1878), Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 3 (9th ed.), New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, p. 194 ,
- ISBN 0500235104
- Vaughan, William (2000), Encyclopedia of Artists, Oxford University Press, Inc., ISBN 0-19-521572-9.
Attribution:
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911), "Bartolommeo di Pagholo, Fra", Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 3 (11th ed.), Cambridge University Press, p. 124 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
External links
- Media related to Fra Bartolomeo at Wikimedia Commons
- Biography from Artist-Biography.info
- Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which includes material on Fra Bartolomeo (see index)