PELLIPARIO, NICOLA. — Painter of majolica, born at Casteldurante (Urbania) no later than 1480, died before 1547.
After working in his native city and at Fabriano, between 1515 and 1520 he moved to Urbino, where, together with his sons, he founded the celebrated Fontana workshop. The art of P., perhaps the greatest of the masters of the so-called “beautiful style,” is distinguished by its free and elegant drawing, harmony of colour, and taste for landscape. In his highly varied subjects, he drew with complete freedom on Italian and German woodcuts and engravings; only in his mature period, when he moved from a preference for light colours, held together by a dominant bluish tone, to more intense hues, with yellow-orange predominating, did he tend to copy Marcantonio’s prints faithfully. P. is also credited with formulating certain characteristic ornamental motifs of the Durantine school. Among the many “services” executed by P. and scattered among numerous museums, the most celebrated are that in the Museo Correr in Venice (ca. 1515; other pieces in Oxford and Amsterdam) and the later one made for Isabella d’Este Gonzaga (20 pieces in Bologna, London, and elsewhere). Also worthy of mention are the Piatto dell'Imperatore in Leningrad (1521), the one depicting the Martirio di s. Caterina in the Museo nazionale in Florence, a Presentazione al tempio, lustred by Mastro Giorgio, in the Museo of Bologna, and numerous other erotic plates and cups in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, in Milan, Pesaro, etc.
PSEUDO PELLIPARIO is the conventional name given to an unknown artist whose style is very close to that of P. and who was often confused with him.