Italian Renaissance Painter Who Painted Members of the Medici Family and Religious Figures
An exhibition of the piece of work of Sandro Botticelli (circa 1445–1510) is planned to open up at the Muscarelle Museum of Art in Virginia on February 11. The show, "Botticelli and the Search for the Divine: Florentine Painting Between the Medici and the Bonfire of the Vanities," which will travel to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in Apr, will bring Botticelli'south famed Venus to the U.s. for the first fourth dimension. In homage to the Renaissance master, nosotros have a closer look at his life and career.
Sandro Botticelli, The Nativity of Venus(circa 1486). Courtesy of the Uffizi Gallery, Florence.
1. His real name wasn't Sandro
Botticelli'southward real name was a mouthful: Alessandro di Mariano di Vanni Filipepi. So, it'south no wonder that the artist's monniker was shortened to Sandro. "Botticelli," meanwhile, was a nickname that meant "petty barrel." According to PBS, it originally came from the painter's brother. It obviously stuck.
Sandro Botticelli, The Rockefeller Madonna: Madonna and Child with Young Saint John the Baptist. Courtesy of Christie's New York.
2. His auction tape tops $10 1000000
As recorded past the artnet Toll Database,Madonna and Child With the Young Saint John the Baptist, fix a new record for Botticelli in January 2013 when information technology sold for $10.iv million at Chistie's New York. The and so-chosen "Rockefeller Madonna" was caused by John D. Rockefeller Three in 1925, and stayed in the family for 50 years earlier passing through the easily of several individual collectors.
An bearding buyer snatched upwards the piece subsequently three minutes of furious phone bidding, according to theWall Street Journal. Prior to the sale, Christie'south sent the painting on a world tour, with stops in London, Moscow, and Hong Kong. To drum up enthusiasm for the piece of work among Asian buyers, who rarely buy Christian-themed fine art, the auction house fifty-fifty held a seven-course Chinese banquet with senior auction house staff.
Sandro Botticelli, The Madonna and Child, with a pomegranate, in an alcove with roses behind. Courtesy of Christie's London.
3. Botticelli loved a good Madonna and Child
"Although he is perhaps best known for his infidel works, The Nascency of Venus and thePrimavera, [Botticelli] during his career executed a number of extremely tender devotional works," said Nichola H.J. Hall, Christie'due south international co-chairman for One-time Master paintings in a video for the sale business firm.
Of the artist'southward meridian xx lots sold at auction, no less than 14 of them are paintings of the Madonna and Child, including his two most expensive works of all time. The Madonna and Child, with a pomegranate, in an alcove with roses behind sold for £3.eight million ($7.5 million) at Christie's London in December 2006 (a tape at the time).
The piece is believed to be a reworking of the famed San Barnaba altarpiece a the Uffizi in Florence, and at to the lowest degree 3 variants of the work belong to American museums: the Fogg Fine art Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts; the Yale University Fine art Gallery in New Haven, Connecticut; and New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Sandro Botticelli and studio, The Madonna and Child Enthroned With Saint John the Baptist and an Angel (circa 1510–fifteen). Courtesy of Sotheby'south New York.
4. Botticelli's work comes up at auction more often than you lot might recall
If you're hitting up the Old Primary sales at the major auction houses, it's non unheard of to find a piece of work or two by Botticelli, or his workshop, on offer. Just this week, for example, Sotheby's New York sold two Madonna and Kid tondo paintings on Jan 25. The Renaissance great can also be less expensive than you might recollect—both works, created in collaboration with the creative person's workshop, brought in just $792,500.
Sandro Botticelli, Primavera(circa 1482). Courtesy of the Uffizi Gallery, Florence.
5. You tin run into both of his about of import paintings in one room
If in that location's one identify that Botticelli fans demand to visit, it's the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, which counts the creative person'south famed canvases Primavera andThe Nascence of Venus among its almost popular works. The museum also houses the artist's 1475 sailAdoration of the Magi.
ThoughVenusis coming to America, the forthcoming exhibition will not characteristic the Uffizi masterpiece merely a smaller work featuring the goddess lone.
While considered a masterpiece today, The Nascency of Venus wasn't ever so well-received co-ordinate to PBS: "Designed to be hung above the marital bed, information technology was a daring celebration of human desire. The painting was so controversial it was kept behind closed doors for half a century."
Fra Filippo Lippi, Madonna With Child and Two Angels. Courtesy of the Uffizi Gallery.
six. Botticelli studied nether the swell Fra Filippo Lippi
When Botticelli turned, at the relatively mature historic period of xviii, to painting, it was noted Italian monk and painter Fra Filippo Lippi who served as his teacher. Co-ordinate to Encyclopedia Britannica, "Lippi's painterly style, which was formed in the early on Florentine Renaissance, was cardinal to Botticelli's own artistic formation, and his influence is evident even in his educatee's tardily works."
In turn, Botticelli after taught Filippino Lippi, Lippi's son—conceived, according to art historian Giorgio Vasari, after the monk seduced a young woman named Lucrezia Buit, likely a novice at a convent, while she was ostensibly posing as the Madonna for a painting for their chapel—post-obit his mentor'south death.
The upcoming American exhibition will nowadays paintings past both Lippis along with the sixteen works by Botticelli.
Sandro Botticelli, Madonna del Magnificat (circa 1483). Courtesy of the Uffizi Gallery.
7. Lorenzo "the Magificent" de Medici was his biggest fan
Like Leonardo da Vinci, Botticelli was amongst the artists at the Florentine court of Lorenzo de Medici, an important patron of the arts during the Renaissance. As a teenager, Botticelli was "offered his own studio space inside the Medici Palace," wrote PBS, where "he rapidly befriended the charismatic heir to the dynasty, Lorenzo.
According to Vasari, the artist painted the now-iconicThe Birth of Venus for the Renaissance ruler'south villa. Members of the Medici family unit feature prominently in two Botticelli paintings:The Adoration of the Magi, where Lorenzo appears with his horse, andMadonna of the Magnificat, featuring Lorenzo's mother as Mary, holding the baby Jesus and surrounded past her own children.
A relief sculpture of Bernardino of Siena organizing the vanities blaze. The sculpture is in Perugia, on the Oratorio di San Bernardino, past Agostino di Duccio, built between 1457 and 1461. Courtesy of Giovanni Dall'Orto, via Wikimedia Eatables.
viii. Botticelli might have destroyed some of his art
Despite Botticelli's close human relationship with Lorenzo, he was also a follower of the Medici patriarch'south archenemy, the Dominican priest Girolamo Savonarola, who advocated for Christian renewal and the destruction of secular art and cultural artifacts.
Vasari wrote of Botticelli that "he was then ardent a partisan [of Savonarola] that he was thereby induced to desert his painting, and, having no income to alive on, fell into very groovy distress."
On February 7, 1497, Savonarola held the infamous blaze of the vanities, at which supposedly sinful objects including artworks and books were destroyed. The truth is lost to history, just it has been said that Botticelli was compelled to burn his mythological paintings at the priest's bidding.
Sandro Botticelli, Trials of Moses. Courtesy of the Vatican Museums.
9. Botticelli painted parts of the Sistine Chapel
The Sistine Chapel is synonymous with Michelangelo, who famously painted its ceiling. What many people don't realize is that many other artists contributed their artwork to the richly-busy room. For his part, Botticelli painted i of the "Stories of Jesus," titledTemptation of Christ, for the chapel's northern wall, andThe Trials of MosesandPunishment of the Rebels for the "Stories of Moses" on the southern wall.
Piero di Cosimo, Portrait of a adult female, said to be of Simonetta Vespucci (circa 1490). Courtesy of Musée Condé, Chantilly, France/the Google Fine art Project/Wikimedia Commons.
10. The purported dear of Botticelli's life was married to someone else
Botticelli is said to have been in dear with Simonetta Vespucci, wife of Marco Vespucci. Although she died in 1476, at about age 22, she is said to accept been the model for Venus and several other female figures in The Birth of Venus andPrimavera. Adding credence to the rumor, Botticelli asked to be cached at her feet in Florence's Church of Ognissanti.
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Source: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/renaissance-master-sandro-botticelli-835226
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