Benozzo Di Lese Di Sandro Gozzoli

Benozzo Dilese Di Sandro Gozzoli (1421-1497)

Benozzo Gozzoli (1421 – 1497) was an Italian Renaissance painter from Florence. He is best known for a series of murals in the Magi Chapel of the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, depicting festive, vibrant processions with fine attention to detail and a pronounced International Gothic influence. The chapel's fresco cycle reveals a new Renaissance interest in nature with its realistic depiction of landscapes and vivid human portraits. Gozzoli is considered one of the most prolific fresco painters of his generation. While he was mainly active in Tuscany, he also worked in Umbria and Rome.

Gozzoli was born Benozzo di Lese, son of a tailor, in the village of Sant'Ilario a Colombano around 1421. His family moved to nearby Florence in 1427. According to the 16th century Italian biographer Giorgio Vasari, Gozzoli was a pupil and assistant of Fra Angelico in the early part of his career. In this role, Gozzoli assisted Angelico in the execution of fresco decorations in the dormitory cells of the Convent of San Marco in Florence. Established contributions here include The Adoration of the Magi in Cosimo de' Medici's cell and the Women at the Tomb in a larger depiction of the Resurrection of Christ in cell 8. Like many other Early Renaissance painters, Benozzo was initially trained as a goldsmith as well as a painter. Between 1444 and 1447, he was therefore able to collaborate with Lorenzo Ghiberti on the famous Gates of Paradise of the Florence Baptistery.

On May 23, 1447, Benozzo was with Fra Angelico in Rome, to where they were called by Pope Eugene IV to carry out fresco decorations in a chapel in the Vatican Palace. This chapel was later demolished, so nothing of these works remains. He then accompanied Angelico to Umbria, where they decorated a chapel vault in the Orvieto Cathedral. Due to political complications in the city, they completed only two of the four vault webs and were again summoned to the Vatican. There, the pair worked for Nicholas V in the Niccoline Chapel until June 1448. Gozzoli is assumed to have made significant contributions in the chapel's frescoes. Furthermore, the attribution of a 1449 Madonna and Child Giving Blessings in the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva is disputed between Gozzoli and Fra Angelico. In Rome, Gozzoli also executed a fresco of St Anthony of Padua in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Aracoeli.

Both Fra Angelico and Lorenzo Ghiberti were to influence much of Gozzoli's work for the rest of his life. From Ghiberti he learned precision in depicting the finest details and how to illustrate a story vividly, while from Fra Angelico, he took his bright color palette, transferring it to the art of fresco painting.

In 1463, likely in fear of the plague, Gozzoli left Florence for San Gimignano, where he executed some extensive works. Most prominent of these is his seventeen-panel fresco cycle on The Life of St Augustine, covering the entire apsidal chapel in the church of Sant'Agostino.[6] In that same church Gozzoli also completed a composition of St. Sebastian Protecting the City from the Plague, in which he depicted St. Sebastian fully clothed and unhurt, thereby going against iconographic canon. In 1465, at the town's heart in the Collegiate Church of Santa Maria Assunta, Gozzoli furthermore painted a fresco of the Martyrdom of Sebastian. He stayed in San Gimignano until 1467, completing some further works in the city and its vicinity.

In 1469, Gozzoli moved to Pisa and began working on his most extensive commission: the vast series of mural paintings in the Campo Santo edifice of Pisa. There, he depicted twenty-four subjects from the Old Testament, ranging from the Invention of Wine by Noah to the Visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon. He was contracted to paint three subjects per year for about ten ducats each. It appears, however, that this contract was not strictly adhered to, for the actual rate of painting was only three pictures in two years. Perhaps the great multitude of figures and accessories was accepted as a set-off against the slower rate of production.

By January 1470 he had executed the fresco of Noah and his Family, followed by the Curse of Ham, the Building of the Tower of Babel (which contains portraits of Cosimo de' Medici, the young Lorenzo, Angelo Poliziano and others), the Destruction of Sodom, the Victory of Abraham, the Marriages of Rebecca and of Rachel, the Life of Moses, etc. In the Cappella Ammannati, facing a gate of the Campo Santo, he also painted an Adoration of the Magi, wherein appears a portrait of himself.

All this enormous mass of work, in which Benozzo was probably assisted by Zanobi Machiavelli, was performed, in addition to several other pictures during his stay in Pisa (including the Glory of St. Thomas Aquinas, now in the Louvre), in sixteen years, lasting up to 1485. This is the latest date which can with certainty be assigned to any work from his hand. Gozzoli died in Pistoiain 1497, perhaps of a pestilence.

In 1478, as a token of their regard, the Pisan authorities had given him a tomb in the Campo Santo. He likewise had a house of his own in Pisa, and houses and land in Florence.