Agnolo Bronzino (Agnolo di Cosimo di Maiano), Monticelli bei Florenz 1503 - Florenz 1572
Garcia de'Medici (ca. 1550)
Museo del Prado, Madrid

This portrait of García de’Medici (1547–1562), third son of Cosimo de’Medici and Leonor de Toledo, is an excellent example of the scant interest in the depiction of children prior to the Enlightenment period. Bronzino offers a faithful rendering of a child’s small, undefined features, but presents him with the same distant, impassive pose used for adult portraits of the Florentine court ambit. García is seen here above all as an heir to the dukedom of Tuscany and for this reason the artist omits any expression or gesture that may encourage us to see a child.

This is quite the opposite approach to the relaxed portrait of Boy holding a Drawing by Caroto. García, whose status is reflected in his sumptuous red silk and gold jacket, richly adorned at the neck and wrists with pearl-sewn embroidery, does not therefore play with the costly trinket that he holds, but rather displays it as if aware of its value.This jewel, which has on occasions been incorrectly identified as a rattle, was an amulet intended to ward off the evil eye. It takes the form of a harpy resting on a horn from which hangs a precious stone. Amulets with harpies/mermaids were used by Neapolitan women for protection during pregnancy, and it may thus have been given to García by his mother, Leonor, or by his grandfather, Pedro de Toledo,Viceroy of Naples. In his other hand the child holds a recently opened orange blossom, a symbol of the purity and innocence characteristic of his age. The portrait has been attributed to Bronzino but it has been considered a workshop replica of a lost original. In fact, it is a workshop production, a fact most clearly evident in the execution of the child’s hands and clothing, which lack the precision and lustre typical of Bronzino’s hand. He is very likely to have intervened on the face, in which, however, he seems to have used a stencil.

The painting can be dated to around 1549–1550 given that García was born in 1547 and cannot have been more than two or three years old here, to judge from his face.6 In addition, in the portrait of García in the palazzo Mansi in Lucca, documented in 1551, he appears to be one or two years older, confirming this hypothesis. It is known that Bronzino painted two portraits of García in 1550, one of which was received by Pope Julius III in June, while the other was finished in July on the occasion of his baptism. Given their importance, neither of these works is likely to be the Prado portrait, which was only partly executed by Bronzino himself.
Source: Museo del Prado
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Agnolo Bronzino (Agnolo di Cosimo di Maiano), wurde in Monticelli bei Florenz 1503 geboren und starb in Florenz 1572. Bronzino, ein sehr gebildeter und belesener Mann, gilt als einer der berühmtesten Vertreter des Florentiner Manierismus und als hervorragender Porträtmaler. Er war Schüler von Raffaellino del Garbo und Jacopo Pontormo und während einer Rom-Reise lernt er die Werke Michelangelos kennen und schätzen. Ab 1540 war er Hofmaler der Medici. Seinen Gemälden ist durch die eigenwillige Verwendung der Farben ein kühler Charakter eigen, aber zugleich auch eine körperlich-plastische Darstellung.

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Agnolo Bronzino (Agnolo di Cosimo di Maiano), Monticelli bei Florenz 1503 - Florenz 1572
Garcia de'Medici (ca. 1550)
Museo del Prado, Madrid

García, whose status is reflected in his sumptuous red silk and gold jacket, richly adorned at the neck and wrists with pearl-sewn embroidery, does not play with the costly trinket that he holds, but rather displays it as if aware of its value.This jewel, which has on occasions been incorrectly identified as a rattle, was an amulet intended to ward off the evil eye. It takes the form of a harpy resting on a horn from which hangs a precious stone. Amulets with harpies/mermaids were used by Neapolitan women for protection during pregnancy, and it may thus have been given to García by his mother, Leonor, or by his grandfather, Pedro de Toledo,Viceroy of Naples.
Source: Museo del Prado, Madrid
_____

Agnolo Bronzino (Agnolo di Cosimo di Maiano), wurde in Monticelli bei Florenz 1503 geboren und starb in Florenz 1572. Bronzino, ein sehr gebildeter und belesener Mann, gilt als einer der berühmtesten Vertreter des Florentiner Manierismus und als hervorragender Porträtmaler. Er war Schüler von Raffaellino del Garbo und Jacopo Pontormo und während einer Rom-Reise lernt er die Werke Michelangelos kennen und schätzen. Ab 1540 war er Hofmaler der Medici. Seinen Gemälden ist durch die eigenwillige Verwendung der Farben ein kühler Charakter eigen, aber zugleich auch eine körperlich-plastische Darstellung.

Tags:   Manierismus Mannerism Frankfurt Städel Ausstellung Maniera Exhibition Maniera Agnolo Bronzino Garcia de'Medici Museo del Prado Madrid Amulett Amulet Hessen Hesse Deutschland Germany Frankfurt am Main

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Albrecht Dürer, Nürnberg 1471 - 1528
Adam (1507)
Museo del Prado

Dürer made this panel and its companion Eve upon returning from his second trip to Italy in 1505. Both works constitute an effort to synthesize what he had learned there, in search of a balance between Italian and Germanic approaches that would permit the ideal perfection of the human body. Thus, the choice of a biblical subject here is mere pretext. Dürer´s knowledge of the classical nude is prodigious, while the exactitude of his lines reveals the hand of a unique engraver rooted in the northern tradition. The growing Italian influence is visible in the monumental grandeur of his figures, while his Germanic orientation is clear in the colors, the precise details and a naturalist taste that is expressionist in nature. All this is further enlivened by his brilliant draftsman´s mind. This was a present from Queen Christine of Sweden to Felipe IV.
Source: Museo del Prado

Tags:   Albrecht Dürer Museo del Prado Madrid Spanien Spain Adam

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Albrecht Dürer, Nürnberg 1471 - 1528
Eva - Eve (1507)
Museo del Prado

Like the painting of Adam, represented on a separate panel, Eve´s unstable posture, her rhythmical movements and her affected gestures are sometimes interpreted as a return to earlier models of Gothic art, instead of what they really are, a foretaste of Mannerism. The solidity of the two bodies, Eve´s slightly Gothic curves -the prototype of a Germanic Venus- and Adam´s fascinated expression, his mouth open in a personification of desire; are outstanding aspects of these two grandiose nudes, the first life-size ones in all of northern painting.
Dürer nuances the differences between the two bodies, using a tan color for the man´s and a pinkish white one for the woman. And he conceives them as isolated, rather than alluding to the fall of Adam and Original Sin, which are subtly symbolized in the character´s expressions and in the motives that accompany them. The reference on the tablet to the fact that the work was painted after the Virgin gave birth (Christmas) determines its date of execution more exactly and alludes to Mary as the new Eve, who saves men from the sin which Adam and Eve are about to commit. Dürer set out his studies and conclusions in a treatise on the proportions of the human body and perspective. This was a fundamental text for successive generations of northern artists.

Queen Christine of Sweden gave this painting to Felipe IV.
Source: Prado

Tags:   Albrecht Dürer Museo del Prado Madrid Spanien Spain Eva Eve

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Albrecht Dürer, Nürnberg 1471 - 1528
Selbstbildnis – Selfportrait (1498)
Museo del Prado

In the same year that he published the Apocalipsis cum figuris, Dürer painted himself as a gentleman, dressed in light toned clothes and looking his best. He wears an open black and white doublet with a striped cap in the same colours, an undershirt trimmed with gold and a silk cord of blue and white threads holding up a grey-brown cloak that falls over his right shoulder. Dürer has sheathed the hands that he uses to paint in grey kidskin gloves indicative of high rank with the aim of elevating his social status from that of craftsman to artist and of locating painting among the liberal arts, as in Italy.

The artist chose a half-length, three-quarter format with two focuses of attention: the face and hands. He located himself in a room that opens onto the outside through a window in the back wall, following Dieric Bouts’ Portrait of a Man of 1462 (London, National Gallery), a format that was subsequently widely adopted in Flanders and Italy. Basing himself on this Flemish format, Dürer added an Italian monumentality in the verticals and horizontals that create the window surround, also evident in the arrangement of his body which repeats the ‘L’ shape of the window in the bust, firmly supported by the arm leaning on the foreground ledge.Also present in this work is a characteristic of all Dürer’s exquisitely detailed portraits, namely his powers of psychological analysis, evident in the contrast between the sensual features and the cold, penetrating gaze.

A painter, printmaker and art theoretician, Albrecht Dürer was born in Nuremberg, gaining fame in his own lifetime through his prints. Dürer trained under the influence of Flemish painting while his two trips to Venice (1494–5 and 1505–7) allowed him to discover the secrets of Renaissance art. A successful portraitist and printmaker, he worked for the Emperor Maximilian I who granted him a pension in 1515, which was renewed by Charles V in 1520. In 1636 the City Council of Nuremberg gave this Self-portrait to Charles I of England. Following Charles’ overthrow and execution, it was sold at his posthumous sale in 1651. The Spanish ambassador Alonso de Cárdenas acquired it for Don Luis de Haro, who gave it to Philip IV in 1654. It remained in the Spanish royal collection until it entered the Museo del Prado in 1827.

Source: Prado

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