Painter: Della Francesca Piero. Part 2

Archangel Michael


Augustinian Saint


Ciclo di Arezzo - Constantine's Dream


Ciclo di Arezzo - Discovery Of The True Cross (Detail)


Piero della Francesca (clic here Wiki) (c. 1415^[1] – October 12, 1492) was an Italian artist of the Early Renaissance. To contemporaries, he was known as a mathematician and geometer as well as an artist, though now he is chiefly appreciated for his art. His painting was characterized by its serene humanism and its use of geometric forms, particularly in relation to perspective and foreshortening. Most of his work was produced in the Tuscan town of Arezzo.

Early years

Piero was born in the village of Borgo Santo Sepolcro^[1], Tuscany (where he also died), to Benedetto de' Franceschi, a tradesman, and Romana di Perino da Monterchi, belonging to the small nobility of Tuscany, as part of Florentine and Tuscan Franceschi noble family.

He may have learned his trade from one of several Sienese artists working in San Sepolcro during his youth. It is known that Piero apprenticed in Florence with Domenico Veneziano, with whom he worked in 1439 on frescoes for the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova (church of Sant'Egidio, now lost). He also knew Fra' Angelico, who introduced him to the other leading masters of the time, Masaccio and Brunelleschi.

In 1442 he returned to San Sepolcro where, three years later, he received the commission for altarpiece of the church of the Misericordia (including the Madonna della Misericordia), which he was to complete only in the early 1460s. In 1449 he executed several frescoes in the Castello Estense and the church of Sant'Andrea of Ferrara, also lost. His influence was particularly strong in the later Ferrarese allegorical works of Cosimo Tura.

Two years later he was in Rimini, working for Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta. In this sojourn he executed the famous fresco of Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta Praying in Front of St. Sigismund as well as the portrait of the condottiero. There he also met another famous Renaissance mathematician and architect, Leon Battista Alberti. Later he moved to Ancona, Pesaro and Bologna.

Legend of the True Cross. The Battle of Heraclius and Chosroes


Piero De Benedetto Dei Franceschi (clic aquí Wiki) , más conocido por su sobrenombre de Piero della Francesca (Sansepolcro, 1416-1492) fue un pintor cuatrocentista italiano.

Su obra se caracteriza por una dignidad clásica, similar a Masaccio. El tratamiento de las figuras es muy volumétrico y se percibe un estudio anatómico, y una cierta monumentalidad. Destaca la inexpresividad y frialdad de los personajes, con figuras que parecen estar muy estáticas, como congeladas y suspensas en sus propios movimientos. Se percibe también la voluntad de construcción de un espacio racional y coherente.

Piero se interesó mucho por los problemas del claroscuro y perspectiva, como su contemporáneo Melozzo da Forli.

La luz en sus cuadros es muy diáfana, con un tratamiento uniforme, sin intensidades ni gradación lumínica (ligeramente arcaica, similar a la de Fra Angelico). Sus ensayos en este sentido llegan a dar la sensación de que sus figuras están modeladas en material dotado de luz propia, intima, radiante. Los frescos como la Leyenda de la Santa Cruz, en el ábside de la Iglesia de San Francisco, en Arezzo, son una obra de arte en luminosidad. La perspectiva lineal era su característica principal a la hora de pintar, lo que se puede apreciar en todos sus cuadros, que se distinguen básicamente por sus coloridos luminosos y un suave pero firme trazo en las figuras. Realizó numerosas obras importantes: El Bautismo de Cristo (1440-45), La Palla de la Misericordia (1445-1460), frescos en el templo Malatestiano de Rimini (1451), y una capilla en la iglesia de San Francisco de Arezzo (1452, 1463), en donde se ve el ciclo de la devoción de la Vera Cruz.