ROSELLINO FAMILY. — ANTONIO, sculptor, son of Matteo Gamberelli, b. at Settignano in 1427, d. at Florence in 1479.
The following works may be attributed to him: some capitals in the church of S. Lorenzo in Florence (1449); the bust of Giovanni Antonio Chellini, signed and dated 1456, and the tabernacle of S. Chiara (c. 1465), both in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal in S. Miniato al Monte, Florence (1461–66), and the bust of Matteo Palmieri (1468) in the National Museum of the Bargello in the same city; the S. Sebastian of Empoli (Collegiate Museum, c. 1470); the altarpiece with the Nativity in S. Maria di Monteoliveto, Naples (c. 1475); the pulpit shaped like a stoup in the cathedral of Prato, executed in collaboration with Mino da Fiesole (1473); the Madonna del Latte in S. Croce, Florence (before 1478). This list must be supplemented by many undated works, among which it will suffice to mention the S. Giovanni Battista of the Compagnia Vancchioni in Florence, now in the Museum of Washington, the other two in the Bargello and the Museum of Faenza; the marble reliefs with the group of the Madonna and Child from S. Clemente at Sociana, in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin, the Hermitage, Leningrad, and the Metropolitan Museum, New York (replicated in a great number of copies in stucco and terracotta). Finally, two works must be added in which Rossellino’s participation was limited: the Mazzari monument in the cathedral of Pistoia, designed by his brother Bernardo, and the tomb of Maria d’Aragona in S. Maria di Monteoliveto, for which Rossellino provided only the design, executed later by Benedetto da Maiano. Having trained under his
ROSSELLI, COSIMO. — Procession and Miracle of the Sacrament of S. Ambrogio. (Att. Alinari)
The lack of elegance in the figures, of unity and coherence in the compositions, of precision in the drawing of his early works, still under the direct influence of Neri di Bicci (Annunciation in the Louvre, 1473; S. Barbara in the Uffizi; Stories of S. Filippo Benizzi in the cloister of the Annunziata in Florence, 1475), is evident again in the Crossing of the Red Sea and the Adoration of the Golden Calf, frescoes in the Sistine Chapel (1481–82), while in the Sermon on the Mount (there), the landscape, under the influence of the artists working near him, has a greater breadth, and, through the intervention of his pupil Piero di Cosimo, some of the figures move with an elegant rhythm of almost Botticellian flavour. But in the Last Supper, neither the memory of Andrea del Castagno and Ghirlandaio, nor the proximity of Perugino, suffice to give unity and coherence to the scene.
Nevertheless, the Roman lesson was not in vain: in the works that follow his return to Florence, there is greater solidity, a more correct drawing, and a notable search for individualization. Indeed, it is from this period that his best portraits date, and in the paintings executed in S. Ambrogio in Florence (1488–1501), the fresco of the Procession of the Sacrament and the Madonna in Glory, a certain stylistic unity and dignity in the representation is achieved, already tending toward the broader and more monumental forms, of a Cinquecento character, seen in the Incoronation of Mary (1505) in S. Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi, also in Florence. Other works are to be found in the Uffizi and in various Italian and foreign museums.
ROSELLINO FAMILY. — ANTONIO, sculptor, son of Matteo Gamberelli, b. at Settignano in 1427, d. at Florence in 1479.
The following works may be attributed to him: some capitals in the church of S. Lorenzo in Florence (1449); the bust of Giovanni Antonio Chellini, signed and dated 1456, and the tabernacle of S. Chiara (c. 1465), both in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the tomb of the Cardinal of Portugal in S. Miniato al Monte, Florence (1461–66), and the bust of Matteo Palmieri (1468) in the National Museum of the Bargello in the same city; the S. Sebastian of Empoli (Collegiate Museum, c. 1470); the altarpiece with the Nativity in S. Maria di Monteoliveto, Naples (c. 1475); the pulpit shaped like a stoup in the cathedral of Prato, executed in collaboration with Mino da Fiesole (1473); the Madonna del Latte in S. Croce, Florence (before 1478). This list must be supplemented by many undated works, among which it will suffice to mention the S. Giovanni Battista of the Compagnia Vancchioni in Florence, now in the Museum of Washington, the other two in the Bargello and the Museum of Faenza; the marble reliefs with the group of the Madonna and Child from S. Clemente at Sociana, in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin, the Hermitage, Leningrad, and the Metropolitan Museum, New York (replicated in a great number of copies in stucco and terracotta). Finally, two works must be added in which Rossellino’s participation was limited: the Mazzari monument in the cathedral of Pistoia, designed by his brother Bernardo, and the tomb of Maria d’Aragona in S. Maria di Monteoliveto, for which Rossellino provided only the design, executed later by Benedetto da Maiano. Having trained under his
older brother Bernardo, with whom he had a workshop in 1457, he soon began his own researches, rapidly evolving from a minute, incisive, linear style, more defined in the contours than in the masses (the Chellini bust in London), toward a soft pictorialism, made of delicate transitions and epidermal preciosity, which clearly reveals an approach to the manners of his contemporary and fellow-countryman Desiderio, with whom he vies in delicate and sensitive