Agnolo Bronzino
BY: Zach Rowen
Biography:
Agnolo Bronzino was born November 17th, 1503 in Monticelli Italy. He spent most of his life in Florence as a painter. Bronzino was trained by Raffaellino del Garbo and Pontormo in the art of painting. Bronzino spent painting renaissance art. Bronzino Entered Raffaellino's studio for 1 year. He worked with pupil/friend/mentor Pontorno at Certos a del Galluzo during Plague years (1523-25). During those years he assisted Pontormo in painting the "Vault Fresco" which was destroyed. Many of Bronzino's religious paintings demonstrate his "theories" art, "As the finest of arts, is capable of evoking plasticity of sculpture and recreates all nature" (International Dictionary of Arts and Artists, 1990). Bronzino had many patrons, some of which being the Medicis and The Grand Duchy of Tuscany. After the siege of Florence by Imperial troops, Bronzino was sheltered by Duke of Urbino in Pesaro. In 1533 he traveled back to Florence and worked on frescoes at the Medici Villa of Careggi and loggia, with Pontormo. All of those paintings were destroyed. Bronzino joined the Florentine academy and was expelled by Francis I of France. Shortly after he painted the nupitals of Francesco de Medici and Joanna of Austria. On November 23rd 1572, Bronzino died in the house of Allori and was buried in San Cristoforo.
Bronzino fits humanism and individualism very well in my mind. His paintings were very detailed on he mostly painted portraits. His work has a "cold" feel to it because of how real it looks and picks at the small details of man's face. Individualism and humanism both fit together because they details for each specific person and the many solo portraits is and idea of everyone is different and should be noticed.
Portrait of Ugolino Martelli
This piece was created in 1535-1538. Today, the piece can be found in the Berlin State Museum. The piece reflects a detached impersonality and the face is emotionless and cold, but is very real looking. For the most part, the piece lacks color but the human qualities such as his nose and lips pop out at the viewer. I find this piece interesting because it almost looks as though he is posing for a photograph, but it is a painting. I believe this piece strongly represents Humanism. To begin, this is a self portrait of man to be studying areligious text of some sort. To me, he looks bored with his text and has other things on his mind. The statue in the backround of the man towering over the cut off head reminds me of man being a dominant species on Earth.
Citaions:
"Agnolo Bronzino." Almanac of Famous People. Gale, 2011. Biography in Context. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
"Agnolo Bronzino." International Dictionary of Art and Artists. Gale, 1990. Biography in Context. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
"Bronzino." Encyclopedia of World Biography. Detroit: Gale, 1998. Biography in Context. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.