Andrea Del Castagno

The manner in which mathematical perspective was deployed in Florentine painting during the second quarter of the quattrocento both clarifies and confuses our idea of how this innovation was viewed. Presented with a system in which the creation of convincing space was an attainable object, painters nevertheless continued to produce work in which perspective was not slavishly constructed but subtly skewed, manipulated and adjusted. Paolo Uccello's panels of The Battle of San Romano and Andrea del Castagno's Last Supper and Passion frescoes at Sant' Apollonia exemplify this, sharing the quirk of serially exploiting and abandoning perspective and consequently of assembling wortds marked by deliberate spatial ambiguity. This article examines how these artists, celebrated for their skill as perspectivists, subordinated mathematical precision to other compositional and didactic ends, and discusses their patronally-driven reasons for doing so.

This thesis analyzes Andrea del Castagno's fresco of the Last Supper in the refectory of Sant'Apollonia, Florence. This study investigates the details of the commission, Castagno's fresco in the iconographic tradition of representations of the Last Supper, the aspects which separate this Last Supper from previous examples in Florentine refectories, the fresco's purpose in relation to its conventual setting, and also the artist's use of both classicizing and contemporary elements and techniques. The central focus of my work is the significance of this fresco in terms of both the imagery Castagno employs and his possible sources. The purpose of this thesis is to recognize the innovative aspects of the fresco, as well as the role that Castagno played in the development of Florentine Renaissance art.

This PhD examines the mural cycle that decorates the upper gallery of the main cloister of the Badia Fiorentina in Florence, called Chiostro degli Aranci, in relation to the postmasaccian Florentine painting. The cycle consists of 10 lunettes painted between 1436 and 1438 with the buon fresco technique and a strip of basement decoration that accompanies them. This work is attributed in this PhD to Giovanni di Consalvo, painter of Portuguese origins, whose name comes from a ledger of the monastery of the Badia Fiorentina, now preserved in the ASF, that mentions repeatedly Consalvo as a recipient of payments for pigments and other materials to carry out the work of the frescoes.

The frescoes in the Chiostro degli Aranci are the result of a commission Abbot Gomes of Portugal, who ruled the Badia Fiorentina during the period, and respond to his desire for reform monasticism and to return it to its origins, to the Rule and to the Desert Fathers.

The analysis allows us to consider the mural cycle of Badia Fiorentina as the first introducer of Flemish influence on Florentine painting, mainly with the pictorial resource of the reflection of objects in the water. The role of the cycle as the introducer of this resource in Florentine painting was very important for the early work of some of the painters of the next generation as Piero della Francesca or Alesso Baldovinetti. On the other hand, teaches us today, over a period of the Florentine painting, dominated by large mural cycles as the apse of Sant'Egidio or the Gianfigliazzi chapel of Santa Trinita and that today we can only learn about them through its predecessor, the cycle of Badia.

Il volume costituisce la prima monografia dedicata all’ultimo decennio di attività del Beato Angelico, ai due soggiorni dell’artista a Roma tra la fine del 1445 e la morte nel 1455. Sommo esponente della pittura quattrocentesca, il domenicano Fra Giovanni da Fiesole operò al servizio di due pontefici, Eugenio IV e Niccolò V, di un cardinale, Juan de Torquemada, e per la casa madre del proprio ordine, Santa Maria sopra Minerva,dove alfine fu sepolto in una tomba monumentale. Dei cicli di affreschi eseguiti dal pittore nella città dei papi, solo la Cappella Niccolina si è conservata, capolavoro artistico e manifesto ideologico della Renovatio Urbis. Nel volume sono ricostruiti in dettaglio la configurazione e i dati salienti anche delle opere perdute, dalla Cappella del Sacramento in Vaticano fino alle Meditationes nel chiostro della Minerva, attraverso fonti testuali e  figurative. Protagonista dell’Umanesimo cristiano, pittore teologo assimilato al Doctor Angelicus Tommaso d’Aquino, l’Angelico determinò, con Leon Battista Alberti, Bernardo Rossellino e Piero della Francesca, una svolta epocale nella Roma del primo Rinascimento.

The book is the  first monograph devoted to the last decade of the activity of Fra Angelico, who in the mid-fifteenth century marked a watershed in early Renaissance Rome. One of the leading representatives of Quattrocento painting, the Dominican friar Giovanni da Fiesole worked for two pontiffs, Eugene IV and NicholasV, a cardinal, Juan deTorquemada, and the mother house of his order, Santa Maria sopra Minerva, where he died and was buried in a monumental tomb.

La pittura dopo Masaccio ✓ Masaccio morì molto giovane e per questo motivo non poté istruire dei veri e propri allievi. Per questo motivo i pittori che gli succedettero dovettero ammirare la sua pittura e adattarla al proprio stile, in un certo senso. Possiamo dire che i suoi successori assunsero la pittura di Masaccio nei modi di più diverse, declinandola in modo differente sia in base alle proprie inclinazioni che alla propria cultura artistica di partenza. ✓ Anche le sculture di Donatello e di Luca della Robbia furono molto influenti in questo contesto. La loro delicatezza e forza espressiva contaminò l'arte di questi pittori. ✓ Sempre in questi anni cresce molto l'interesse per la pittura fiamminga: l'apprezzamento, da parte dei committenti, nei confronti di chi dimostrasse di aver assimilato l'arte nordica era in crescita.

This youtube special, filmed for the Evansville Museum of Art and intended for a wide public audience, explores themes of love and sexuality in Renaissance Florence, including between opposite and same-sex partners.

The video can be viewed here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ1YPBSwaP0&t=666s