POLLAIOLO, ANTONIO son of JACOPPO BENCI, called del. — Painter, sculptor, goldsmith, and architect, born in Florence ca. 1431 (according to others, 1426, or 1429, or 1433), died in Rome, where he is buried, in S. Pietro in Vincoli, on 4 February 1498. His contemporaries considered him among the greatest artists.
In all likelihood, his initial education took place in the workshop of a goldsmith; the goldsmith’s character echoes, more or less vividly, in all his works. This is confirmed by his relations with goldsmiths such as Sali and Finiguerra (for whom he often supplied designs for niello work), as well as by the fact that Antonio maintained a goldsmith’s workshop for a longer period on Via Vacchereccia. On the other hand, the Silver Cross for S. Giovanni (Florence, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo), to which P. contributed together with Betto di Francesco Betti and Miliano Dei (1475), is technically a work of goldsmithery; so too, later (1478), was the Silver Altar, on which he executed the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, also for S. Giovanni (now in the aforementioned museum), a work divided among Verrocchio, Antonio di Salvi, Francesco di Giovanni, and Bernardo di Cenni. This activity and sensibility as a goldsmith, expressed in the incisive precision of the medium of expression that is the line, did not conflict with Antonio’s development of a sculptural language; indeed, it contributed to II.
As a painter, in 1460 he executed three large canvases depicting the Labors of Hercules for Piero de’ Medici, now lost. At the same time and afterward (1466), he supplied the designs for the vestments of the Duomo (the famous Embroideries, now in the Museo dell’Opera). Other works of goldsmithery are recorded in the documents between 1460 and 1465. The fresco decoration of the chapel of the cardinal of Portugal in S. Miniato began in October 1467. Baldovinetti worked there alongside Antonio and Piero. At the beginning of that year, together with Verrocchio and Luca della Robbia, P. was a member of the commission entrusted with placing the ball on the lantern of the dome of S. Maria del Fiore.
