Beccafumi: a Mannerist’s Color and Light

Domenico Beccafumi - Penelope - c. 1514 - Oil on panel, 84x48 cm - Seminario Patriarcale, Venice (click photo for larger image)Domenico Beccafumi (c. 1486-1551) was an Italian Mannerist painter who worked in Siena. Originally named Domenico di Pace, he took the name Beccafumi from his patron, a wealthy Sienese who sent him to study in Siena and Rome. He was, with Parmigianino, the most interesting of the non-Florentine Mannerist painters, and the last of the great Sienese school. A member of the High Renaissance generation, his years in Rome (1510-12) saw the painting of Raphael's Stanze and Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling, both of which influenced him. His use of strong effects of perspective and contapposto, his intensity of emotion, and his use of subtle color and lurid effects of light, are all stylistic features of central Italian painting of the 1530s and 1540s, which he probably knew as a result of the dispersal of Roman artists after the Sack of Rome of 1527.

With three other paintings, this panel makes up an ideal gallery of virtuous women from ancient times. They were originally in the Ospedale in Siena.

Navarrete: A Spanish Mannerist

Juan Fernández de Navarrete - Baptism of Christ - c. 1568 - Oil on panel, 49 x 37 cm - Museo del Prado, MadridSpanish painter and draughtsman Juan Fernández de Navarrete (1538-1579) was a deaf mute, and the principal sources for his life and work are writings by Fray José de Sigüenza and Ceán Bermúdez. He received his early training in the Hieronymite monastery of La Estrella in Logroño, and as a young man he traveled in Italy, visiting Milan, Rome, Naples and Venice.The majority of Navarrete's paintings were commissioned for the royal monastery church of S Lorenzo at the Escorial near Madrid, which was then being built by Philip II. This painting is a trial piece that Navarrete executed for Philip II in 1565. The painting shows that the artist was familiar with the work of the later Michelangelo, and his follower Daniele da Volterra. This makes sense, since in the mid-1550s Navarrete stayed in Rome.

Beccafumi: A Mannerist Sienese with a Modern Vision

Domenico Beccafumi - Mystical Marriage of St Catherine - c. 1521 - Oil on canvas, 220 x 205 cm - The Hermitage, St. Petersburg (click photo for larger image)Sienese Mannerist Domenico Beccafumi (1486-1551) took his name from a wealthy Sienese patron of the same name—who also had him apprenticed to a local painter. From the very beginning, Beccafumi's highly personal style was concerned with light: he made light vibrate to convey emotion or spiritual illumination. He achieved his effects through strong perspective and contrapposto, soft colors, and elongated, elaborately intertwined figures. Contrapposto refers to the twisting of the human figure on its own vertical axis. Like other of the Mannerists, Beccafumi would wield influence during the much later Modern era.

Pontormo: A Modern Vision

Jacopo da Pontormo - Saint Matthew, 1527-28, oil on wood, Capponi Chapel, San Felicita, Florence (click photo for larger image)Brilliant Florentine painter, Jacopo da Pontormo (1494-1557) was initially influenced by the styles of Piero di Cosimo, Leonardo da Vinci and Andrea del Sarto. These artistic giants shaped Pontormo's early works. However, he possessed a vision that, in hindsight, can be seen to foreshadow what would become tendencies in Modern Art. He is one of the painters of the first generation of Mannerists. Pontormo’s style was marked by elongated forms, heightened emotion, and tension between figures and space. The stylish look of Mannerism was followed by the Counter-Reformation Baroque era, which represents a grand extension of Renaissance ideals. It is the characteristics of Mannerism, however, that would become embedded in the modern artistic ethic.

The Eccentric Painter

Amico Aspertini - Heroic Head - c. 1496 - Tempera on wood, 37,5 x 36,5 cm - Christian Museum, Esztergom (click photo for larger image)Amico Aspertini (1475-1552) was an Italian Mannerist painter from Bologna. He was known for having an eccentric personality and this comes through in his paintings, which are often bizarre in expression. The monochrome painting featured here with the stone-like frame resembles a relief. However, it is interesting to note that the bust is not in the painted frame, but before it.