Paolo Uccello was the apprentice of Lorenzo Ghiberti, whom he assisted in the execution of the east doors for the Baptistery of Florence (1403–1424). Though he lived a long life, his works are few. He is known to have been active in Venice from 1425 to 1431 where he rendered mosaics on the Basilica of San Marco façade, now lost. The frescoes in the Chapel of the Assumption in the Cathedral of Prato (c. 1435) are attributed to him and depict scenes from the lives of St. Stephen and the Virgin, as well as Virtues. These scenes show a precision of rendering with stiff, repetitive drapery folds, dramatic gestures, and varied facial expressions. His fresco in the Cathedral of Florence depicting Sir John Hawkwood on horseback (1436) is a scene that inspired Andrea del Castagno’s Niccolò da Tolentino (1456), also in the cathedral, and Donatello’s Equestrian Monument of Gattamelata (c. 1445–1453) in the Piazza del Santo, Padua. The fresco is made to look like a bronze monument, a substitute to the marble memorial Florence was preparing in Hawkwood’s honor just as England claimed his body. As Giorgio Vasari informs, Uccello was completely taken with the latest developments in perspective, which he applied to his frescoes in the Chiostro Verde at Santa Maria Novella (c. 1450) and the panels depicting the Battle of San Romano (c. 1430s; London, National Gallery, Paris, Louvre, and Florence, Uffizi). Unfortunately, in the battle scenes, he took the techniques to an extreme, resulting in ornamental rather than dramatic renderings of bloodshed and death. The portrait of A Young Lady of Fashion (early 1460s; Boston, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum) is also attributed to Uccello. It shows a profile view that emphasizes wealth through costume and jewels, the customary portrayal at the time of a noblewoman.
The Uffizi (“offices”) is a structure commissioned by Cosimo I de’ Medici to bring under one roof the governmental offices that were scattered throughout Florence. This move caused major protests from government administrators, as well as owners whose homes and shops were demolished to make way for the project. Cosimo gave the commission to Giorgio Vasari, who died in 1574, and the building was completed by Vasari’s pupil, Bernardo Buontalenti, to whom the design of the Porta delle Suppliche, one of the Uffizi’s side entrances, is usually given.
The structure is composed of two blocks connected by a loggia based on the triumphal arch motif and facing the Arno River. In the lower stories of the two blocks are also loggias, here barrel-vaulted, that provide shelter from the elements and at one time served as a waiting area for those who came to conduct business with Uffizi administrators. Columns alternate with pilasters and sculptures in rhythmic triadic successions, patterns repeated in the upper stories, where the window pediments and supporting brackets are also arranged in triadic repetitions. This play of forms and rhythms is what qualifies the building as Mannerist.
Once the building was completed, some of its rooms were set aside for housing the Medici’s art treasures. In 1737, Anna Maria Ludovica de’ Medici bequeathed the family collection to the city of Florence, establishing the building as one of the finest museums in the world. Forty-five rooms display works from the 13th through 18th centuries, most representative of the Italian Renaissance of Tuscany, although ancient Roman, medieval, and Northern art are also well represented.
Born in Florence in 1568, to a well-to-do family of merchants, Maffeo Barberini received a Jesuit education, his ecclesiastic career promoted by his uncle, an apostolic protonotary. He graduated with a degree in law from the University of Pisa in 1589. Pope Paul V gave Maffeo the cardinalate in 1610, after serving as legate in France, and in 1623, he ascended the papal throne as Urban VIII. Among the most nepotistic of popes, he immediately granted favors to his family members. He elevated his brother Antonio and nephews Francesco and Antonio to the cardinalate and appointed his nephew Taddeo prefect of Rome and prince of Palestrina. Later, he also appointed Francesco vice chancellor and the younger Antonio commander of the papal army.
In 1626, Urban added the Duchy of Urbino to the Papal States by forcing aging Duke Francesco Maria della Rovere to cede the territory to the papacy. In 1641, he seized the territory of Castro when Duke Odoardo Farnese defaulted on his interest payments. Castro was returned to the Farnese in 1644, after a peace agreement was reached between them and Urban. Urban did much to embellish the city of Rome. Already as cardinal he had patronized such artists as Pietro Bernini, Francesco Mochi, and Ludovico Carracci. As pope, he appointed Gian Lorenzo Bernini as his official artist and promoted painters Nicolas Poussin, Pietro da Cortona, and Andrea Sacchi.
A group of Dutch artists who were active in the city of Utrecht in the early decades of the 17th century. Most went to Rome, where they were exposed to the style of Caravaggio, and brought this visual vocabulary back to Utrecht, making it available to other Dutch masters. The most notable figures among the Utrecht Caravaggists are Dirck van Baburen, Hendrick Terbrugghen, and Gerrit van Honthorst. All three painted mainly religious scenes while in Italy and changed to genre upon returning to the North, as the demand for religious images in the Dutch market diminished after the region embraced Protestantism.