Kortney-FrancoAgnolo+Bronzino

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=**__Agnolo Bronzino__**  (Ahn-goh-loh Brahn-zee-noh)= =__Born__ 1503/__Death__ 1572/__Country__ Italy    = =Some of his Portraits= =  = = = =Allegory (Venus,Cupid, Folly,and Time) =

__**Renissance**__ 14th to 16th Century Europe Characterized by a renewed interest in classical art, architecture, literature, and Philosophy. Renaissance began in Italy and gradually spread to the Rest of Europe. Major influence Leonardo da Vinci, Michaelangelo and Raphel. Italian for "style" or "stylishness" a trend in 16th century Italian art. Mannerist artists cultivated a variety of elegant, refined,virtuosic, and highly artifical styles, often featuring elongated figures,sinuous contours, bizarre effects of scale and lightings shallow pictorial space and intense colors. Picture of Pontormo
 * __Mannerism__**
 * Born in Monticello outside of Florence Italy Agnolo was the pupil and adopted son of Pontormo. According to his friend Vasari, he was a pupil first of Raffaellino del Garbo, and then of Pontormo, who was the main influence on his style and to whom he was devoted.Pontormo introduced his portrait as a child into one of his series on Joseph in Egypt .(Pontormo after the Tuscan town from which he came, was one of the leaders of the Mannerist movement.)In 1523 an outbreak of plauge swept through Florence, Pontomo took Agnolo to Cerosta where they worked together on a series of frescoes now badly damaged.(Fresco-a painting medium in which colors are applied to a plaster ground usually a wall or ceiling.)Agnolo's reputation was established by 1530. He worked for the Duke of Urbino till 1532 when he returned to Florence to work on portraits. In 1540 he worked as Court Painter for Duke Cosimo until 1565, where he decorated the private chapel of the Duke's wife Eleanor of Toledo.**
 * Through Agnolos life he stayed active in the arts . In 1563 Agnolo and Vasari funded the Florence Academy of fine arts in 1563. In 1569 he began work on a large fresco but died in 1572 before he could finish it. His Pupil Alessandra Albri completed his work on the fresco.**


 * Most of his career was spent as a portraitist but he was also a Poet, which is reflected in some of his most personal portraits. He was less successful as a religious painter, his paintings lacked real feeling which made the painting empty, almost every one of the elegant posturing, and contorted poses can be traced back to Raphael or to Michelangelo, whom Bronzino idolized. Copying that type of work is what gave Mannerism a bad name. Agnolo also did major work with a series of tapestries on The Story of Joseph of the Palazzo Vecchio. Agnolo's work has been described as Cold, cultured, and unemotionally bizarre, fascinating, and unsettling. One of his most famous painting the Allegory is a reflection of morals, the figures and objects makes you think about the interaction of people having to choose between endulging in the hearts lust for the devils temptations or to live a God fearing obident life. This painting to me depicts the forbiden erotic pleasures of life. His portraits of Cosimo and Eleonora, and figures of their court such as Bartolomeo Panciatichi and his wife Lucrezia, are his best known works.**