BONFIGLI, BENEDETTO. – Painter, born in Perugia around 1420 and died there in 1496. He was one of the principal representatives of the Umbrian school of the 15th century. He is first mentioned in 1445; in 1450 he painted in Rome, at the Vatican; in 1453 he was back in Perugia. Formed under the influence of Tuscan masters, he blended the styles of B. Gozzoli and Fra Angelico while always preserving a precious Gothic linearity derived from the Sienese Domenico di Bartolo. Yet he possessed a distinctive originality: a clear narrative vein, festive color, delicate treatment of figures—elegant and refined—and a taste for certain decorative details that became stylistic elements (for example, the small garlands of flowers adorning the hair of the angels). His principal works are in Perugia: the frescoes in the Chapel of the Priors (now in the Pinacoteca), depicting the *Stories of St. Louis and St. Herculanus* (1454), rendered with a pleasing narrative style not untouched by the influence of Fra Filippo Lippi; the *Annunciation* (Pinacoteca), and the *Madonna of the Angels* (there).
B. also painted numerous gonfalons. – See Plate CVIII.