FRANCIABIGIO

born 1482/83, Florence? died 1525, Florence also called Francesco Di Cristofano, Francesco Giudini, or Giudici Italian Renaissance painter, best known for his portraits and religious paintings, whose style included early Renaissance, High Renaissance, and Proto-Mannerist elements. His early style is filled with movement and attention to descriptive detail, strongly reminiscent of 15th-century Italian painting. Later, he was attracted to the Florentine works of Raphael, as can be seen in his Madonna del Pozzo (c. 1508; Accademia, Florence). In the atrium of SS. Annunziata in Florence he painted the Marriage of the Virgin (1513) as a portion of a series in which Andrea del Sarto, a leading Florentine painter, was chiefly concerned. When the friars uncovered this work before it was quite finished, Franciabigio was so incensed that, seizing a mason's hammer, he struck at the head of the Virgin and some other heads, and the fresco, which would otherwise be his masterpiece in that method, was mutilated. For a number of years, Franciabigio maintained a studio with Andrea del Sarto. Together with Andrea's student, Pontormo, they decorated the Medici villa at Poggio a Caiano, where Franciabigio's Triumph of Cicero displays his talent for narrative painting. Andrea's influence on Franciabigio may be seen in the dark, smoky background and the soft, dramatic lighting of the St. Job Altar (1516, Uffizi, Florence).