Beccafumi: Chromatic Lyricism
Monday, January 30, 2017 at 9:00AM 
Domenico Beccafumi - Head of a Youth Seen in Profile - 1529-35 - Polychrome oil on paper, 28 x 21 cm - Musée du Louvre, Paris (click photo for larger image)The marvelous Sienese artist Domenico Beccafumi (c. 1486-1551) was (with Parmigianino) the most interesting of the non-Florentine Mannerists and the last of the great Sienese painters. Although he was part of the High Renaissance generation of painters—Beccafumi’s works point toward the eventual modern era, in their strong effects of perspective and contrapposto, intensity of emotion, subtle, shot color, and lurid effects of light.
Mannerism rejected Renaissance harmony and balance in favor of emotional intensity and ambiguity—a uniquely modern idea. It was an enormously popular movement for a time, however the Church favored the more conservative Baroque for its Counter-Reformation commissions.
This “bozzetto" on paper is a study for the head of the youth seated in the foreground in one of the frescoes of the vault of the Sala del Concistoro of the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena. While it maintains certain classical elements found in sixteenth century painting—it also responded to a demand for something different—something new—in the Italy of its day.