Benozzo Gozzoli

Benozzo Gozzoli (c. 1421 – 1497) was an Italian Renaissance painter from Florence. He is best known for a series of murals in the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi depicting festive, vibrant processions with wonderful attention to detail and a pronounced International Gothic influence.

Biography

Apprenticeship

He was born Benozzo di Lese [The nickname "Gozzoli" does not appear in any documents; Giorgio Vasari recorded it in his second edition of the "Vite" (1568).] in the village of Sant'Ilario a Colombano around 1421, and moved with his family to Florence in 1427. According to Giorgio Vasari, in the early part of his career he was a pupil and assistant of Fra Angelico: some of the works in the convent of San Marco of Florence were executed by Gozzoli from Angelico's design. In 1444-1447 he collaborated with Lorenzo Ghiberti and his studio on the Paradise Doors of the Battistero di San Giovanni.

On May 23 1447 Gozzoli was in Rome with Fra Angelico, called by Pope Eugene IV to carry out the fresco decoration of a chapel in the Vatican Palace. Later the two worked until June 1448 in the Cappella Niccolina for Nicholas V. From 1449 is a banner with "Madonna and Child" in the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, perhaps designed by Angelico. In Rome he executed also, in Santa Maria "in Aracoeli", a fresco of "St Anthony and Two Angels". Benozzo's last collaboration with Angelico is the vault of the Duomo di Orvieto in Umbria.

In Umbria

In 1449 he left Angelico, and moved to Umbria. From 1450 is an "Annunciation" in Narni, signed OPU [S] BENOT [I] DE FLORENT [IA] . In the monastery of San Fortunato, near Montefalco, he painted a "Madonna and Child with Saints and Angels", and three other works. One of these, the altarpiece representing St Thomas receiving the Girdle of the Virgin, is now in the Lateran Museum and shows the affinity of Benozzo's early style to Angelico's. He next painted in the monastery of S. Francesco, Montefalco, filling the choir with three registers of subjects from the life of the saint, with various accessories, including portrait heads of Dante, Petrarch and Giotto. This work was completed in 1452, and is still marked by the style of Angelico, crossed here and there with a more distinctly Giottesque influence. In the same church, in the chapel of Saint Jerome, is a fresco by Gozzoli of the Virgin and Saints, the Crucifixion and other subjects.

He remained at Montefalco (with an interval at Viterbo) probably till 1456, employing Pier Antonio Mezzastris as assistant. Thence he went to Perugia, and painted in a church a "Virgin and Saints" that is now in the local academy.

Soon afterwards her returned to his native Florence, the epicenter of "Quattrocento" art. Between 1459 and 1461, Gozzoli painted what may be his most important work: his frescoes of the Magi in the Magi Chapel of the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, the "Journey of the Magi to Bethlehem", and in the tribune, a composition of "Angels in Paradise". Gozzoli incorporated portraits of the Medici family into his fresco "The Journey of the Magi". Gozzoli also included his self-portrait in the procession, with his name written around the rim of his cap ("illustration above"). His 'Virgin and Child with Saints" of 1461, in the National Gallery, London, belongs also to the period of this stay in Florence. [Another small picture in the same gallery, the "Rape of Helen", is of dubious authenticity.]

Late years in Tuscany

In 1464 Gozzoli left Florence for San Gimignano, where he executed some extensive works; in the church of Sant'Agostino, a composition of "St. Sebastian protecting the City from the Plague" of this same year, 1464; over the entire choir of the church, a triple course of scenes from the legends of St Augustine, from the time of his entering the school of Tegaste on to his burial, seventeen chief subjects, with some accessories; in the Pieve di San Gimignano, the "Martyrdom of Sebastian", and other subjects, and some further works in the city and its vicinity. Here his style combined something of Filippo Lippi with its original elements, and he received co-operation from Giusto d'Andrea.

He stayed in this city till 1467, and in 1469 began the vast series of mural paintings in the Campo Santo of Pisa with which his name is specially identified. There are twenty-four subjects from the Old Testament, from the "Invention of Wine by Noah" to the "Visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon". He contracted to paint three subjects per year for about ten ducats each. It appears, however, that this contract was not strictly adhered to, for the actual rate of painting was only three pictures in two years. Perhaps the great multitude of figures and accessories was accepted as a set-off against the slower rate of production.

By January 1470 he had executed the fresco of "Noah and his Family", followed by the "Curse of Ham", the "Building of the Tower of Babel" (which contains portraits of Cosimo de' Medici, the young Lorenzo, Angelo Poliziano and others), the "Destruction of Sodom", the "Victory of Abraham", the "Marriages of Rebecca and of Rachel", the "Life of Moses", etc. In the Cappella Ammannati, facing a gate of the Campo Santo, he painted also an "Adoration of the Magi", wherein appears a portrait of himself. All this enormous mass of work, in which Benozzo was probably assisted by Zanobi Macchiavelli, was performed, in addition to several other pictures during his stay in Pisa (including the "Glory of St. Thomas Aquinas", now in the Louvre), in sixteen years, lasting up to 1485. This is the latest date which can with certainty be assigned to any work from his hand. Gozzoli died in Pistoia in 1497, perhaps of a pestilence.

In 1478 the Pisan authorities had given him, as a token of their regard, a tomb in the Campo Santo. He had likewise a house of his own in Pisa, and houses and land in Florence.

Evaluation

According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition: "Gozzoli's art does not rival that of his greatest contemporaries, either in elevation or in strength, but it is attractive because of its sense of what is rich, lively and abundant in the appearances of people and objects. His landscapes, which are crowded with birds and animals, especially dogs, are more varied, and alluring than those of any predecessor; his compositions are crowded with figures, more characteristically true when happily and gracefully occupied than when the demands of the subject require tragic or dramatic intensity, or turmoil of action; his colours are bright and festive. Gozzoli's genius was, on the whole, more versatile and referential than particularly original; his drawings exhibited some imperfections, especially towards the edges, and in his draftmanship, and in the perspective of his elaborate buildings. In fresco-painting he used the technique of tempera. Of his untiring industry, the intensity of his work and the number of paintings produced are the most convincing proof...In rectitude of life he is said to have been worthy of his first master, Fra Angelico."

Major works

*"The Rape of Helen" (c. 1437-1439) - Tempera on panel, 51 x 61 cm, National Gallery, London
*"
*"Women at the Tomb" (1440-1441) - Fresco, San Marco, Florence
*"Adoration of the Magi" (1440-1441) - Fresco, San Marco, Florence
*, Rome
*"Madonna and Child between St Francis and St Bernardine of Siena" ((1450) - Fresco, San Fortunato, Montefalco
*"St Fortunatus Enthroned" (1450) - Fresco, 200 x 110 cm, San Fortunato, Montefalco
*"Madonna and Child" (1450) - Fresco, 250 x 135 cm, San Fortunato, Montefalco
*"St. Anthony of Padua" (1450s) - Panel, Santa Maria in Aracoeli, Rome
*"Madonna della Cintola (1450) - Tempera on panel, 133 x 165 cm, Pinacoteca Vaticana, Vatican
*"Madonna and Child Surrounded by Saints" (1452) - Fresco, San Francesco, Cappella di San Gerolamo, Montefalco
*"The Departure of St Jerome from Antioch" (1452) - Fresco, Cappella di San Gerolamo, San Francesco, Montefalco
*"St Jerome Pulling a Thorn from a Lion's Paw" (1452) - Fresco, Cappella di San Gerolamo, San Francesco, Montefalco
*"Madonna and Child with Sts Francis and Bernardine, and Fra Jacopo "(c. 1452) - Tempera on panel, 34 x 54 cm, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
*"Madonna and Child with Sts John the Baptist, Peter, Jerome, and Paul" (1456) - Tempera on panel, 122 x 212 cm, Galleria Nazionale dell'Umbria, Perugia
*"Procession of the Magi" (1459-1460) - Frescoes, Magi Chapel, Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Florence
*"Madonna and Child" (c. 1460) - Tempera on panel, 84.8 x 50.6 cm, Institute of Arts, Detroit
*"Purification Altarpiece (1461) - Tempera on panel, 158 x 171 cm, National Gallery, London
*"St. Dominic Reuscitates Napoleone Orsini" (1461) - Tempera on panel, 25 x 35 cm, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
*"Fall of Simon Magus" (1461-1462) - Tempera on panel, 24 x 35,5 cm, Royal Collection, Hampton Court
*"The Dance of Salome" (1461-1462) - Tempera on panel, 23.8 x 34.3 cm, National Gallery of Art, Washington
*"Histories of St. Augustine" (1464-1465) - Frescoes, Sant'Agostino, San Gimignano
*"Four Evangelists" (1464-1465) - Fresco, Sant'Agostino, San Gimignano
*"Saints" (1464-1465) - Frescoes, Sant'Agostino, San Gimignano
*"St. Sebastian Intercessor" (1464-1466) - Fresco, 527 x 248 cm, Sant'Agostino, San Gimignano
*"Martyrdom of St Sebastian" (1465) - Tempera on panel, 525 x 378 cm, Collegiate Church, San Gimignano
*"Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine (1466) - Tempera on panel, 90 x 50 cm, Pinacoteca Comunale, Terni
*"Madonna and Child between Sts. Andrew and Prosper" ("Madonna dell'Umiltà"; 1466) - Tempera on panel, 137 x 138 cm, Museo Civico, San Gimignano
*"Triumph of St. Thomas Aquinas" (1471) - Tempera on panel, 230 x 102 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris
*"The Vintage and Drunkenness of Noah" (1469-1484) - Fresco, Camposanto, Pisa
*"Histories of the Holy Virgin "(1484) - Transferred frescoes, Biblioteca Comunale, Castelfiorentino
*"Descent from the Cross" (1491) - Oil on canvas, 180 x 300 cm, Museo Horne, Florence

References

*Dale Kent, "Cosimo de' Medici and the Florentine Renaissance" (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000).
*Franco Cardini, "The Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici" (Firenze: Mandragora, 2001).
*Roger J. Crum, "Roberto Martelli, the Council of Florence, and the Medici Palace Chapel", "Zeitschrift & Kunstgeschichte", 59 (1996).
*1911

Notes

External links

* [http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/bio/g/gozzoli/biograph.html Web Gallery of Art]
* [http://www.abcgallery.com/G/gozzoli/gozzoli.html Olga's Gallery]
* [http://www46.homepage.villanova.edu/john.immerwahr/aug.htm Life of St. Augustine Frescoes with Narrative Explanation]