GOZZOLI, BENOZZO. - Painter, b. in Florence ca. 1420, d. in Pistoia on 4 Oct. 1497. His real name was Benozzo di Lese di Sandro, and the surname G. occurs only in the 2nd ed. of Vasari's Vite. He was a pupil and follower of Angelico; he nevertheless appears mentioned for the first time (Jan. 1444) in an act of undertaking to collaborate on the famous doors of the Florentine Baptistery with Lorenzo and Vittorio Ghiberti. In Rome (1447) and Orvieto (1449), on the other hand, he worked with Angelico as a painter.
The essential moments of his activity in Umbria and Tuscany may be summarized as follows: he painted at Montefalco (1450); at Viterbo (1453; Stories of St. Rose, lost), at Florence (1459; Procession of the Magi, Palazzo Riccardi); he frescoed in S. Agostino at S. Gimignano (1463-65); from 1467 to 1484 he executed the Stories of the Old Testament (Pisa, Camposanto, almost destroyed); he is found, finally, at Florence in Jan. 1497.
The extent of his activity as a sculptor alongside the Ghibertis is unknown, but it must, in any case, have been limited and subordinate. On the other hand, collaborating in Rome on the pictorial decoration of the Niccoline Chapel, G. was dutifully faithful to Angelico.
The same may be said of Orvieto (Cathedral, chapel of S. Brizio, the two segments of the vault), where it is not easy to isolate his artistic individuality.
But at Montefalco (panel of the Assumption, Vatican Pinacoteca, ca. 1450; church of S. Francesco, Stories of the Saint, 1452), G., by then independent, shows a tendency to dilate the master's forms; to suggest a more generic plasticism by means of a heavier color, simplifying the effect of the cangianti; to complicate the pursuit of perspective and landscape, though without spatial synthesis. The art of B. G. resolves itself into a pleasant, convincing, at times poetic narrative (fresco in Palazzo Riccardi), in a style that does not go beyond the terms of Angelico's taste, without however grasping its inner and religious meaning. G. did not remain indifferent to the innovative achievements of Florentine painters such as Baldovinetti and Filippo Lippi, but without modifying the formal typology of his own master. Among the most significant works: the Stories of St. Augustine at S. Gimignano; the Madonna, Angels and Saints (1461) of the London Gallery; the Madonna and Saints (1466) in the Gallery of S. Gimignano; the other in the Gallery of Terni (1466), etc. The influence of B. G. on fifteenth-century Umbrian painting was very extensive, especially on Alunno, Bonfigli, Mezzastris, Boccatis and others.
Bibliography5 works
Luigi Grassi