POLO, MARCO — The oldest Venetian redaction of the Milione (first half of the 14th century) — Rome, Biblioteca Casanatense, MS 3999, fol. 7.
Works of genuine and intense spiritual value belong exclusively to him, such as the Donatello-like small David in Berlin (State Museum); the Apollo and Dofne in London (National Gallery); the Ercole e Dejanira in the Jarvre Museum (New Haven, U.S.A.); and the two finished sketches for the Fatiche d’Ercole, formerly in the Uffizi (subsequently lost as a result of the Second World War). In these latter paintings the “aerial” passage reflects the same vibrant, sensitive linear exaltation of the figures, and is further supported by the ductus of the impasto colour, which crumbles across the painted surface. As regards his sculptural activity, the monument to Sisto IV fully exalts Antonio’s style and is an entire bundle of nervous plastic elements. These qualities are attenuated, owing to the predominance of his brother’s collaboration, in the monument to Innocenzo VIII, also in S. Pietro. Parallel to the Fatiche d’Ercole on canvas is the bronze Ercole e Anteo (Florence, Bargello), of unsurpassable dynamic and “expressionistic” effect. The Busto di guerriero in terracotta, also in the Bargello, must at least be mentioned. Many drawings are attributed to Antonio “or to his school, identifiable by the ‘functional’ significance of the contour line. Typical of Antonio are: the Adamo ed Eva (Uffizi), the Ercole e l’Idra in the British Museum; the Ercole e i giganti in the Museum of Cambridge (U.S.A.), etc. The Ricensi for S. Maria del Fiore (Museo dell’Opera), the engraving of the Battaglia dei nudi, etc., derive from Antonio’s drawings.
His brother, PIERO di JACOPO BENCI, was also a painter. He was probably born in 1443 and died almost certainly in 1496 in Rome, where he was buried with Antonio in S. Pietro in Vincoli.
He collaborated with his brother on the Fatiche d’Ercole; on his own, he executed (1469–70) the Virtù for the backs of the seats in the Florentine tribunal of the Mercatanza. Here too, however, Antonio must have supplied his brother with the drawings, as is proved by the cartoon for the Carità. Piero executed the Fede, the Speranza, the Temperanza, the Giustizia, and the Prudenza (Florence, Uffizi). In these allegories it is shown how Piero follows in his brother’s manner, with varying degrees of success. The artist displays a calmer figurative vision, resolved into more polished, precious, and limpid chromatic surfaces, at times with a sense of detail that presupposes knowledge of Flemish painting. This is especially evident in the panel of the Annunciazione in the Berlin Museum. On the other hand, P. del P. also has a feminine type characterized by a broader yet full facial oval. Verrocchio (van Marle) also influenced him, as appears from the S. Michele in the Gardini Museum in Florence. Another work in which P. worked alone, engaging with a complex composition, is the panel of the Incoronazione della Vergine in the Collegiata of S. Gimignano, signed and dated “Piero del P. Florentino 1483.” As a portraitist, Pietro is recognizable in several female profiles: a Ritratto muliebre in the Uffizi, another in the Galleria Pitti, and a third in the National Gallery in London. He probably accompanied his brother Antonio to Rome in 1483, when the latter was beginning the monument to Pope Sisto IV. If Pietro collaborated on it, his intervention was certainly entirely material, given the work’s genuine individuality; whereas the shortcomings of the monument to Pope Innocenzo VIII reflect his extensive intervention.