CARADOSSO. — Cristoforo Foppa, known as C., was a goldsmith, medallist, and sculptor. Born around 1452 in Mondonico in Brianza, he died in 1527, probably in Rome, where he carried out his earliest activity. Indeed, he is credited with the bronze doors of the reliquary of the chains of St. Peter (S. Pietro in Vincoli), datable to 1477.
In Milan, where he had gone in 1480 to serve Ludovico il Moro, he executed the sculptural decorations of the Bramantesque baptistery of S. Satiro. After several trips to other Italian cities, undertaken in search of ancient works, in 1502 he was consulted in Milan on some advice for a door of the Duomo. To this same period belong the small plaques from the Dreyfuss and Piot collections, derived from the bas-reliefs of an inkwell he had carved (1504) for Isabella d'Este, in which the energy of the modelling recalls Luca Signorelli. After the fall of Ludovico il Moro (1499), C. went to Rome, where he devoted himself to the art of goldsmithing (a tiara of Julius II, lost by the end of the 18th century, of which reproductions exist) and of the medal, during the pontificates of Julius II, Leo X, Adrian VI, and Clement VII. Particularly important are the medal of Julius II and the commemorative medal of Bramante, which bears the architect's effigy and, on the reverse, his design for St. Peter's; these works were conceived in vigorous and adherent forms, yet in a spontaneous and personal manner, to classical models. He earned the praise and esteem of his contemporaries, among whom especially enthusiastic were Sabba Castiglioni and Benvenuto Cellini.
Luisa Marzoli Feslikenia