MASACCIO

born Dec. 21, 1401, Castel San Giovanni [now San Giovanni Valdarno, Italy] died , autumn 1428, Rome, Papal States Detail from Expulsion of Adam and Eve, fresco by Masaccio, c. 1427; in the byname of Tommaso Di Giovanni Di Simone Guidi important Florentine painter of the early Renaissance whose frescoes in the Brancacci Chapel of the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence (c. 1427) remained influential throughout the Renaissance. In the span of only six years, Masaccio radically transformed Florentine painting. His art eventually helped create many of the major conceptual and stylistic foundations of Western painting. Seldom has such a brief life been so important to the history of art. Additional reading Giorgio Vasari, The Lives of the Artists, trans. by Julia Conaway Bondanella and Peter Bondanella (1991; originally published in Italian, 1550), provides an early biography; a modern work is John T. Spike, Masaccio (1995). The artist's work is examined in Bruce Cole, Masaccio and the Art of Early Renaissance Florence (1980); and Andrew Ladis, The Brancacci Chapel, Florence (1993). Paul Joannides, Masaccio and Masolino: A Complete Catalogue (1993), includes over 450 plates and a bibliography of studies on the works of both artists. Bernard Berenson, The Italian Painters of the Renaissance (1952, reissued 1980); and Bruce Cole, Italian Art, 12501550: The Relation of Renaissance Art to Life and Society (1987), place Masaccio's work in historical context. Bruce Cole