Bronzino, Agnolo

(Agnolo Tori, 1503-1572)

   Italian Mannerist painter who trained with Jacopo da Pontormo and who became the leading artist in Florence after his master's death. Bronzino worked as court painter to Duke Cosimo I de' Medici and excelled mainly as a portraitist. His Eleonora da Toledo and Her Son Giovanni de'Medici (c. 1550; Florence, Uffizi) is one of the great masterpieces of the Mannerist movement and reflects the refined tastes of the Medici court. Cosimo's wife is here shown in a luxurious costume, befitting her aristocratic rank. She is presented as an exemplary mother who lovingly embraces her son, her elongated fingers and torso and porcelain-like skin being typical of Bronzino's visual vocabulary. The Portrait of a Young Man (c. 1550) at the New York Metropolitan Museum again stresses the sitter's social station. The unidentified male features a lavish costume and aloof demeanor. He holds a book in his hand to denote his main pastime, the pursuit of knowledge. Bronzino's Deposition (1545; Besançon, Musée des Beaux-Arts), intended as the altarpiece for the chapel of Eleonora in the Palazzo Vecchio, is among the most visually appealing religious works he created. The painting owes much to Pontormo in the complexity of the composition, the lighting effects, and colorism. In fact, the crouching figure who supports the body of Christ is closely related to the crouching male in Pontormo's Deposition (1525-1528) in the Capponi Chapel in the Church of Santa Felicita, Florence. Bronzino's Allegory of Venus and Cupid (1540s; London, National Gallery) has baffled scholars who have tried to unravel its intended meaning. Meant for a highly educated audience, the work is filled with allegorical figures in strange combinations that are no longer completely understood. Bronzino was also an accomplished poet, and perhaps poetry played a part in the iconography of his painting.