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BOTTICELLI, SANDRO
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Page 309
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See also: BOTTICELLI, SANDRO , properly ALESSANDRO DI MARIANO DEI FILIPEPI (1444-1510), Florentine painter, was See also:born at See also:Florence in 1444, in a See also:house in the Via Nueva, Borg' Ognissanti. This was the See also:home of his See also:father, Mariano di Vanni dei Filipepi, a struggling See also:tanner. Sandro, the youngest See also:child but one of his parents, derived the name Botticelli, by which he was commonly known, not, as related by See also:Vasari, from a See also:goldsmith to whom he was apprenticed, but from his eldest See also:brother Giovanni, a prosperous See also:broker, who seems to have taken See also:charge of the boy, and who for some See also:reason See also:bore the See also:nickname Botticello or Little See also:Barrel. A return made in 1457 by his father describes Sandro as aged thirteen, weak in See also:health, and still at school (if the words sta al See also:legare are to be taken as a misspelling of sta al leggere, otherwise they might perhaps mean that he was apprenticed either to a jeweller or a bookbinder). One of his See also:elder See also:brothers, See also:Antonio, who afterwards became a bookseller, was at this See also:time in business as a goldsmith and See also:gold-See also:leaf-beater, and with him Sandro was very probably first put to See also:work. Having shown an irrepressible See also:bent towards See also:painting, he was apprenticed in 1458–1459 to Fra Filippo See also:Lippi, in whose workshop he remained as an assistant apparently until 1467, when the See also:master went to carry out a See also:commission for the decoration with frescoes of the See also:cathedral See also:
The See also: Pollaiuolo influence dominates, with some slight admixture of that of Verrocchio, in the See also:fine figure of Fortitude, now in the Uffizi, which was painted by Botticelli for the Mercanzia about 1470; this is one of a series of the seven Virtues, of which the other six, it seems, were executed by See also:Piero Pollaiuolo from the designs of his brother Antonio. The same influence is again very See also:manifest in the two brilliant little pictures at the Uffizi in which the youthful Botticelli has illustrated the See also:story of See also:Judith and Holofernes; in his injured portrait of a See also:man holding a See also:medal of Cosimo de' See also:Medici, No. 1286 at the Uffizi; and in his See also:life-sized " St See also:Sebastian" at See also:Berlin, which we know to have been painted for the church of Sta Maria See also:Maggiore in 1473. Tradition and See also:internal See also:evidence seem also to point to Botticeili's having occasionally helped, in his earliest or Pollaiuolo See also:period, to furnish designs to the school of engravings in Florence which had been founded by the goldsmith Maso See also:Finiguerra. Some authorities hold that he must have attended for a while the much-frequented workshop of Verrocchio. But the " Fortitude " is the only authenticated See also:early picture in which the Verrocchio influence is really much apparent; the various other pictures on which this See also:opinion is founded, chiefly Madonnas dispersed among the museums of See also:Naples, Florence, See also:Paris and elsewhere, have been shown to be in all See also:probability the work not of Sandro himself, but of an See also:anonymous artist, influenced partly by him and partly by Verrocchio, whose individuality it has been endeavoured to reconstruct under the provisional name of Amico di Sandro. At the same time we know that the See also:young Botticelli stood in friendly relations with some of the pupils in Verrocchio's workshop, particularly with Leonardo da See also:Vinci. Among the many " Madonnas " which See also:bear Botticelli's name in galleries public and private, the earliest which carries the unmistakable See also:stamp of his own See also:hand and invention is that which passed from the Chigi collection at See also:Rome to that of Mrs See also:Gardner at See also:Boston. At the beginning of 1474 he entered into an agreement to work at See also:Pisa, both in the Campo Santo and in the See also:chapel of the Incoronata in the Duomo, but after spending some months in that See also:city abandoned the task, we know not why. Next in the See also:order of his preserved See also:works comes probably the much-injured See also:round of the "Adoration of the Magi " in the National Gallery (No. 1033), long ascribed in error, like the earlier oblong See also:panel of the same subject, to Filippino Lippi. (To about this date is assigned by some the well-known " See also:Assumption of the Virgin surrounded with the heavenly hierarchies," formerly at See also:
Gallery [No. 1126]; but See also: recent See also:criticism has proved that the tradition is mistaken which since Vasari's time has ascribed this picture to Botticelli, and that it is in reality the work of a subordinate painter somewhat similarly named, See also:Francesco Botticini.) A more mature and more celebrated " Adoration of the Magi " than either of those in the National Gallery is that now in the Uffizi, which Botticelli painted for Giovanni Lami, probably in 1477, and which was originally placed over an See also:altar against the front See also:wall of the church of Sta Maria Novella to the right inside the See also:main entrance. The See also:scene is here less crowded than in some other of the master's representations of the subject, the conception entirely sane and masculine, with none of those elements of bizarre fantasy and over-strained sentiment to which he was sometimes addicted and which his imitators so much exaggerated; the See also:execution vigorous and masterly. The picture has, moreover, See also:special See also:interest as containing lifelike portraits of some of the See also:chief members of the Medici See also:family. Like other leading artists of his time in Florence, Botticelli had already begun to profit by the patronage of this family. For the house of Lorenzo Il Magnifico in the Via Larga he painted a decorative piece of See also:Pallas with See also:lance and See also:shield (not to be confounded with the banner painted with a similar allegoric See also:device of Pallas by Verrocchio, to be carried by Giuliano de'Medici in the famous See also:tournament in 1475 in which he wore the favour of La Bella Simonetta, the wife of his friend Marco See also:Vespucci). This Pallas by Botticelli is now lost, as are several other decorative works in See also:fresco and panel recorded to have been done by him for Lorenzo Il Magnifico between 1475 and Lorenzo's See also:death in 1492. But Sandro's more especial See also:patron, for whom were executed several of his most important still extant works, was another Lorenzo, the son of Pierfrancesco de' Medici, See also:grandson of a natural brother of Cosimo See also:Pater Patriae, and inheritor of a vast See also:share of the family estates and interests. For the See also:villa of this younger Lorenzo at See also:Castello Botticelli painted about 1477–1478 the famous picture of " Primavera " or See also:Spring now in the See also:Academy at Florence. The See also:design, inspired by Poliziano's poem the " Giostra," with reminiscences of See also:Lucretius and of See also:Horace (perhaps also, as has lately been suggested, of the See also:late Latin " Mythologikon " of See also:Fulgentius) thrown in, is of an enchanting fantasy, and breathes the finest and most essential spirit of the early See also:Renaissance at Florence. See also:Venus fancifully draped, with See also:Cupid hovering above her, stands in a See also:
In connexion with this and other classic and allegoric pictures by the master, much romantic See also: speculation has been idly spent on the supposition that the chief personages were figured in the likeness of Giuliano de' Medici and Simonetta Vespucci. Simonetta in point of fact died in 1476, Giuliano was murdered in 1478; the See also:web of See also:romance which has been spun about their names in See also:modern days is quite unsubstantial; and there is no reason whatever why Botticelli should have introduced the likenesses of these two supposed lovers (for it is not even certain that they were lovers at all) in pictures all of which were demonstrably painted after the death of one and most of them after the death of both. The tragedy of Giuliano's assassination by the Pazzi conspirators in 1478 was a public event which certainly brought employment to Botticelli. After the See also:capture and execution of the criminals he was commissioned to paint their See also:effigies See also:hanging by the See also:neck on the walls of the Palazzo del See also:Podesta, above the entrance of what was formerly the Dogana. In the course of Florentine See also:history public buildings had on several previous occasions received a similar grim decoration: the last had been when See also:Andrea del See also:Castagno painted in 1434 the effigies, hanging by the heels, of the chief citizens outlawed and expelled on the return of Cosimo de'Medici. Perhaps from the time of this Pazzi commission may be dated the evidences which are found in some of Botticelli's work of a closer study than heretofore of the virile methods and energetic types of Castagno. His frescoes of the hanged conspirators held their See also:place for sixteen years only, and were destroyed in 1494 in consequence of another revolution in the city's politics. Two years later (148o) he painted in rivalry with Ghirlandaio a See also:grand figure of St See also:Augustine on the choir See also:screen of the Ognissanti; now removed to another See also:part of the church. About the same time we find clear evidence of his contributing designs to the workshops of the " fine-manner " engravers in the shape of a beautiful See also:print of the See also:triumph of Bacchus and See also:Ariadne adapted from an antique See also:sarcophagus (the only example known is in the See also:British Museum), as well as in nineteen small cuts executed for the edition of See also:Dante with the commentary of Landino printed at Florence in 1481 by Lorenzo della Magna. This series of prints was discontinued after See also:canto xix., perhaps because of the material difficulties involved by the use of See also:line engravings for the decoration of a printed See also:page, perhaps because the artist was at this time called away to Rome to undertake the most important commission of his life. Due possibly to the same See also:call is the unfinished See also:condition of a much-damaged, crowded " Adoration of the Magi " by Botticelli preserved in the Uffizi, the design of which seems to have influenced Leonardo da Vinci in his own Adoration (which in like manner remains unfinished) of nearly the same date, also at the Uffizi. The task with which Botticelli was charged at Rome was to take part with other leading artists of the time (Ghirlandaio, Cosimo See also:Rosselli, See also:Perugino and See also:Pinturicchio) in the decoration of See also:Sixtus IV.'s chapel at the Vatican, the See also:ceiling of which was afterwards destined to be the See also:
Internal evidence shows that Sandro and his assistants bore a chief share in the series of papal portraits which decorate the niches between the windows. His share in the decoration of the walls with subjects from the Old and the New Testament consists of three frescoes, one illustrating the history of See also: Moses (several episodes of his early life arranged in a single See also:composition) ; another the destruction of Korah, Dathan and Abiram; a third the temptation of See also:Christ by Satan (in this See also:case the main theme is relegated to the background, while the foreground is filled with an animated scene representing the See also:ritual for the See also:purification of a leper). On these three frescoes Botticelli laboured for about a See also:year and a See also:half at the height of his See also:powers, and they may be taken as the central and most important productions of his career, though they are far from being the best-known, and from their situation on the dimmed and stained walls of the chapel are by no means easy of inspection. Skill in the interlinking of complicated See also:groups; in the See also:principal actors See also:energy of dramatic action and expression not yet overstrained, as it came to be in the artist's later work; an incisive vigour of See also:portraiture in the personages of the male bystanders; in the faces and figures of the See also:women an equally vital grasp of the See also:model, combined with that See also:peculiar See also:strain of haunting and See also:melancholy See also:grace which is this artist's own; the most expressive care and skill in linear draughtsman-See also:ship, the richest and most inventive charm in fanciful See also:costume and decorative colouring, all combine to distinguish them. During this time of his stay in Rome (1481–1482) Botticelli is recorded also to have painted another " Adoration of the Magi," his fifth or See also:sixth embodiment of the same subject; this has been identified, no doubt rightly, with a picture now in the Hermitage gallery at St See also:Petersburg. Returning to Florence towards the end of 1482, Botticelli worked there for the next ten years, until the death of Lorenzo I1 Magnifico in 1492, with but slight See also:variations in manner and sentiment, in the now formed manner of his middle life. Some of the recorded works of this time have perished; but a See also:good many have been preserved, and except in the few cases where the See also:dates of commission and See also:payment can be established by existing records, their sequence can only be conjectured from internal evidence. A See also:scheme of work which he was to have undertaken with other artists in the See also:Sala dei Gigli in the Palazzo Pubblico came to nothing (1483); a set of important mythologic frescoes carried out by him in the See also:vestibule of a villa of Lorenzo Il Magnifico at Spedaletto near See also:Volterra in 1484 has been destroyed by the effects first of See also:damp and then of See also:fire. To 1482–1483 belongs the fine altar-piece of See also:San Barnabo (a Madonna and Child with six See also:saints and four angels), now in the academy at Florence. Very nearly of the same time must be the most popular and most often copied, though very far from the best-preserved, of his works, the round picture of the Madonna with singing angels in the Uffizi, known, from the See also:text written in the open choir-See also:book, as the " Magnificat." Somewhere near this must be placed the beautiful and highly finished See also:drawing of " Abundance," which has passed through the See also:Rogers, See also:Morris See also:Moore and See also:Malcolm collections into the British Museum, as well as a small Madonna in the Poldi-Pezzoli collection at See also:Milan, and the fine full-faced portrait of a young man, probably some See also:pupil or apprentice in the studio, at the National Gallery (No. 626). For the See also:marriage of Antonio Pucci to Lucrezia Dini in 1483 Botticelli designed, and his pupils or assistants carried out, the interesting and dramatic set of four panels illustrating See also:Boccaccio's See also:tale of Nastagio degl' Onesti, which were formerly in the collection of Mr See also:Barker and are now dispersed.His magnificent and perfectly preserved altar-piece of the Madonna between the two saints See also:
These gifts were less suited on the whole to the illustration of the See also: Hell than of the later parts of the poem, and in the fiercer episodes there is often some puerility and inadequacy of invention. Throughout the Hell and See also:Purgatory Botticelli maintains a careful adherence to the text, illustrating the several progressive incidents of each canto on a single page in the old-fashioned way. In the See also:Paradise he gives a freer See also:rein to his invention, and his designs become less a literal illustration of the text than an imaginative commentary on it. Almost all interest is centred on the persons of Dante and See also:Beatrice, who are shown us again and again in various phases of ascending progress and rapt contemplation, often with little more than a See also:bare symbolical See also:suggestion of the beatific visions presented to them. Most of the drawings remain in See also:pen outline only over a light preliminary See also:sketch with the See also:lead stylus; all were probably intended to be finished in See also:colour, as a few actually are. To the period of these drawings (1492–1497) would seem to belong the fine and finely preserved small round of the " Virgin and Child with Angels " at the Ambrosiana, Milan, and the famous " Calumny of See also:Apelles " at the Uffizi, inspired no doubt by some contemporary See also:translation of the text by See also:Lucian, and equally remarkable by a certain feverish energy in its sentiment and composition, and by its exquisite finish and richness of execution and detail. Probably the small " St Augustine " in the Uffizi, the injured " Judith with the See also:head of Holofernes " in the See also:Kaufmann collection at Berlin, and the " Virgin and Child with St John," belonging to Mr Heseltine in London, are works of the same period. See also:Simone di Mariano, a brother of Botticelli long See also:resident at Naples, returned to Florence in 1493 and shared Sandro's home in the Via Nuova. He soon became a devoted follower of Savonarola, and has left a manuscript See also:chronicle which is one of the best See also:sources for the history of the See also:friar and of his movement. Sandro himself seems to have remained aloof from the movement almost until the date of the execution of Savonarola and his two followers in 1498. At least there is clear evidence of his being in the confidence and employ of Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco so late as 1496 and 1497, which he could not possibly have been .had he then been an avowed member of the party of the Piagnoni. It was probably the enforced departure of Lorenzo from Florence in 1497 that brought to a premature end the master's great undertaking on the illustration of Dante.After Lorenzo's return, following on the overthrow and death of Savonarola in 1498, we find no trace of any further relations between him and Botticelli, who by that time would seem to have become a declared devotee of the friar's memory and an adherent, like his brother, of the defeated See also: side. During these years of See also:swift political and spiritual revolution in Florence, documents give some glimpses of him: in 1497 as painting in the monastery of Monticelli a fresco of St See also:Francis which has perished; in the See also:winter of the same year as See also:bound over to keep the See also:peace with a See also:neighbour living next to the small suburban villa which Sandro held jointly with his brother Simone in the See also:parish of San Sepolcro; in 1499 as paying belated matriculation fees to the gild of doctors and druggists (of which the painters were a See also:branch); and again in 1499 as carrying out some decorative paintings for a member of the Vespucci family. It has been suggested, probably with reason, that portions of these decorations are to be recognized in two panels of dramatic scenes from See also:Roman history, one illustrating the story of See also:Virginia, which has passed with the collection of Senatore See also:Morelli into the gallery at See also:Bergamo, the other a history of See also:Lucretia formerly belonging to See also:Lord See also:Ashburnham, which passed into Mrs Gardner's collection at Boston. These and the few works still remaining to be mentioned are all strongly marked by the strained vehemence of design and feeling characteristic of the master's later years, when he dramatizes his own high-strung emotions in figures flung forward and swaying out of all See also:balance in the vehemence of action, with looks See also:cast agonizingly earthward or heavenward, and gestures of See also:wild yearning or See also:appeal. These characters prevail still more in a small Pieta at the Poldi-Pezzoli gallery, probably a contemporary copy of one which the master is recorded to have painted for the Panciatichi chapel in the church of Sta Maria Maggiore; they are See also:present to a degree even of See also:caricature in the larger and coarser painting of the same subject which bears the master's name in the See also:Munich gallery, but is probably only a work of his school. The mystic vein of religious and political speculation into which Botticelli had by this time fallen has its finest illustration in the beautiful symbolic " Nativity " which passed in See also:succession from the Aldobrandini, the Ottley, and the See also:Fuller See also:Maitland collections into the National Gallery in 1882, with the apocalyptic inscription in See also:Greek which the master has added to make his meaning clear (No. 1034). In a kindred vein is a much-injured symbolic " Magdalene at the See also:foot of the See also:Cross " in private See also:possession at See also:Lyons. Among extant pictures those which from internal evidence we must put latest in the master's career are three panels illustrating the story of St See also:Zenobius, of which one is at See also:Dresden and the other two in the collection of Dr See also:Mond in London. The documentary notices of him after 1500 are few. In 1502 he is mentioned in the See also:correspondence of See also:Isabella d'See also:Este, marchioness of See also:Gonzaga, and in a poem by Ugolino Verino. In 1503–1504 he served on the See also:committee of artists appointed to decide where the See also:colossal See also:David of Michelangelo should be placed.In these and the following years we find him paying fees to the See also: company of St See also:Luke, and the next thing recorded of him is his death, followed by his See also:burial in the Ortaccio or See also:garden burial-ground of the Ognissanti, in May 1510. The strong vein of poetical fantasy and mystical See also:imagination in Botticelli, to which many of his paintings testify, and the capacity for religious conviction and emotional See also:conversion which made of him an ardent, if belated, See also:disciple of Savonarola, coexisted in him, according to all records, with a strong vein See also:BOTTLE 309 of the laughing See also:humour and love of rough See also:practical and verbal jesting which belonged to the Florentine See also:character in his age. His studio in the Via Nuova is said to have been the resort, not only of pupils and assistants, of whom a number seem to have been at all times working for him, but of a company of more or less idle gossips with brains full of rumour and See also:tongues always wagging. Vasari's See also:account of the straits into which he was led by his absorption in the study of Dante and his See also:adhesion to the See also:sect of Savonarola are evidently much exaggerated, since there is See also:proof that he lived and died, not See also:rich indeed, but possessed of See also:property enough to keep him from any real pinch of See also:distress. The story of his work and life, after having been the subject in recent years of much half-informed study and speculation, has at length been fully elucidated in the work of Mr H. P. See also:Horne cited below,—a masterpiece of documentary See also:research and See also:critical exposition.Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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