Pontormo
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Jacopo Carucci or Carrucci (; May 24, 1494 – January 2, 1557), usually known as Jacopo (da) Pontormo or simply Pontormo (), was an Italian
Mannerist Mannerism is a style in European art that emerged in the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520, spreading by about 1530 and lasting until about the end of the 16th century in Italy, when the Baroque style largely replaced it ...
painter and portraitist from the Florentine School. His work represents a profound stylistic shift from the calm
perspectival Perspectivism (also called perspectivalism) is the epistemological principle that perception of and knowledge of something are always bound to the interpretive perspectives of those observing it. While perspectivism regard all perspectives and ...
regularity that characterized the art of the Florentine Renaissance. He is famous for his use of twining poses, coupled with ambiguous perspective; his figures often seem to float in an uncertain environment, unhampered by the forces of gravity.


Biography and early work

Jacopo Carucci was born at Pontorme (then known as Pontormo or Puntormo), near
Empoli Empoli () is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Florence, Tuscany, Italy, about southwest of Florence, to the south of the Arno River, Arno in a plain formed by the river. The plain has been usable for agriculture since Ancient Ro ...
, to Bartolomeo di Jacopo di Martino Carrucci and Alessandra di Pasquale di Zanobi.
Vasari Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance painter, architect, art historian, and biographer who is best known for his work '' Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'', considered the ide ...
relates how the orphaned boy, "young, melancholy, and lonely", was shuttled around as a young apprentice: Pontormo painted in and around
Florence Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italy, Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in Metropolitan City of Florence, its metropolitan province as of 2025. Florence ...
, often supported by
Medici The House of Medici ( , ; ) was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first consolidated power in the Republic of Florence under Cosimo de' Medici and his grandson Lorenzo "the Magnificent" during the first half of the 15th ...
patronage. A foray to Rome, largely to see
Michelangelo Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6March 147518February 1564), known mononymously as Michelangelo, was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was inspir ...
's work, influenced his later style. Haunted faces and elongated bodies are characteristic of his work. An example of Pontormo's early style is a fresco depicting the Visitation of the Virgin and St Elizabeth, with its dancelike, balanced figures, painted from 1514 to 1516. This early ''Visitation'' makes an interesting comparison with his painting of the same subject which was done about a decade later, now housed in the parish church of St. Michael Archangel in Carmignano, about 20 km west of Florence. Placing these two pictures together—one from his early style, and another from his mature period—throws Pontormo's artistic development into sharp relief. In the earlier work, Pontormo is much closer in style to his teacher, Andrea del Sarto, and to the early sixteenth-century renaissance artistic principles. For example, the figures stand at just under half the height of the overall picture, and though a bit more crowded than true high renaissance balance would prefer, at least are placed in a classicizing architectural setting at a comfortable distance from the viewer. In the later work, the viewer is brought almost uncomfortably close to the
Virgin Virginity is a social construct that denotes the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. As it is not an objective term with an operational definition, social definitions of what constitutes virginity, or the lack thereof ...
and St. Elizabeth, who drift toward each other in clouds of drapery. Moreover, the clear architectural setting that is carefully constructed in the earlier piece has been completely abandoned in favour of a peculiar nondescript urban setting. The
Joseph Joseph is a common male name, derived from the Hebrew (). "Joseph" is used, along with " Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the modern-day Nordic count ...
canvases (now in the
National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of more than 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current di ...
in London) offer another example of Pontormo's developing style. Done around the same time as the earlier ''Visitation'', these works (such as '' Joseph in Egypt'', at left) show a much more mannerist leaning. According to
Giorgio Vasari Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance painter, architect, art historian, and biographer who is best known for his work ''Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'', considered the ideol ...
, the sitter for the boy seated on a step is his young apprentice,
Bronzino Agnolo di Cosimo (; 17 November 150323 November 1572), usually known as Bronzino ( ) or Agnolo Bronzino, was an Italians, Italian Mannerism, Mannerist painter from Florence. His sobriquet, ''Bronzino'', may refer to his relatively dark skin or r ...
. In the years between the SS Annunziata and San Michele ''Visitation''s, Pontormo took part in the
fresco Fresco ( or frescoes) is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the painting become ...
decoration of the salon of the Medici country
villa A villa is a type of house that was originally an ancient Roman upper class country house that provided an escape from urban life. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the f ...
at
Poggio a Caiano Poggio a Caiano is a town and ''comune'' (municipality) in the province of Prato in the region of Tuscany in Italy, located south of the provincial capital of Prato. It has 9,944 inhabitants. The town is the birthplace of Filippo Mazzei. Dem ...
(1519–20), 17 km NNW of Florence. There he painted frescoes in a
pastoral The pastoral genre of literature, art, or music depicts an idealised form of the shepherd's lifestyle – herding livestock around open areas of land according to the seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. The target au ...
genre style, very uncommon for Florentine painters; their subject was the obscure
classical myth Classical mythology, also known as Greco-Roman mythology or Greek and Roman mythology, is the collective body and study of myths from the ancient Greeks and ancient Romans. Mythology, along with philosophy and political thought, is one of the ma ...
of '' Vertumnus and Pomona'' in a
lunette A lunette (French ''lunette'', 'little moon') is a crescent- or half-moon–shaped or semi-circular architectural space or feature, variously filled with sculpture, painted, glazed, filled with recessed masonry, or void. A lunette may also be ...
. In 1522, when the plague broke out in Florence, Pontormo left for the Certosa di Galluzzo, a cloistered Carthusian monastery where the
monk A monk (; from , ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a man who is a member of a religious order and lives in a monastery. A monk usually lives his life in prayer and contemplation. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many reli ...
s followed vows of silence. He painted a series of frescoes, now quite damaged, on the passion and resurrection of Christ. These frescoes reveal especially strongly the influence of
Albrecht Dürer Albrecht Dürer ( , ;; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528),Müller, Peter O. (1993) ''Substantiv-Derivation in Den Schriften Albrecht Dürers'', Walter de Gruyter. . sometimes spelled in English as Durer or Duerer, was a German painter, Old master prin ...
's engravings, which often provided inspiration to Pontormo after he returned to Florence.


Main works in Florence

The large altarpiece canvas for the
Brunelleschi Filippo di ser Brunellesco di Lippo Lapi (1377 – 15 April 1446), commonly known as Filippo Brunelleschi ( ; ) and also nicknamed Pippo by Leon Battista Alberti, was an Italian architect, designer, goldsmith and sculptor. He is considered to ...
-designed Capponi Chapel in the church of Santa Felicita, Florence, portraying '' The Deposition from the Cross'' (1528), is considered by many Pontormo's surviving masterpiece. The figures, with their sharply modelled forms and brilliant colours, are united in an enormously complex, swirling ovular
composition Composition or Compositions may refer to: Arts and literature *Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography * Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include ...
, housed by a shallow, somewhat flattened space. Although commonly known as ''The Deposition from the Cross'', there is no actual
cross A cross is a religious symbol consisting of two Intersection (set theory), intersecting Line (geometry), lines, usually perpendicular to each other. The lines usually run vertically and horizontally. A cross of oblique lines, in the shape of t ...
in the picture. The scene might more properly be called a ''
Lamentation A lament or lamentation is a passionate expression of grief, often in music, poetry, or song form. The grief is most often born of regret, or mourning. Laments can also be expressed in a verbal manner in which participants lament about something ...
'' or ''Bearing the Body of Christ''. Those who are lowering (or supporting)
Christ Jesus ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Christianity, central figure of Christianity, the M ...
appear as anguished as the mourners. Though they are bearing the weight of a full-grown man, they barely seem to be touching the ground; the lower figure in particular balances delicately and implausibly on his front two toes. These two boys have sometimes been interpreted as
angel An angel is a spiritual (without a physical body), heavenly, or supernatural being, usually humanoid with bird-like wings, often depicted as a messenger or intermediary between God (the transcendent) and humanity (the profane) in variou ...
s, carrying Christ in his journey to
Heaven Heaven, or the Heavens, is a common Religious cosmology, religious cosmological or supernatural place where beings such as deity, deities, angels, souls, saints, or Veneration of the dead, venerated ancestors are said to originate, be throne, ...
. In this case, the subject of the picture would be more akin to an '' Entombment'', though the lack of any discernible
tomb A tomb ( ''tumbos'') or sepulchre () is a repository for the remains of the dead. It is generally any structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber, of varying sizes. Placing a corpse into a tomb can be called '' immurement'', alth ...
disrupts that theory, just as the lack of cross poses a problem for the ''Deposition'' interpretation. Finally, it has also been noted that the positions of Christ and the Virgin seem to echo those of Michelangelo's ''Pietà'' in Rome, though here in the ''Deposition'' mother and son have been separated. Thus in addition to elements of a ''Lamentation'' and ''Entombment'', this picture carries hints of a ''
Pietà The Pietà (; meaning "pity", "compassion") is a subject in Christian art depicting the Mary (mother of Jesus), Blessed Virgin Mary cradling the mortal body of Jesus Christ after his Descent from the Cross. It is most often found in sculpture. ...
''. It has been speculated that the bearded figure in the background at the far right is a
self-portrait Self-portraits are Portrait painting, portraits artists make of themselves. Although self-portraits have been made since the earliest times, the practice of self-portraiture only gaining momentum in the Early Renaissance in the mid-15th century ...
of Pontormo as
Joseph of Arimathea Joseph of Arimathea () is a Biblical figure who assumed responsibility for the burial of Jesus after Crucifixion of Jesus, his crucifixion. Three of the four Biblical Canon, canonical Gospels identify him as a member of the Sanhedrin, while the ...
. Another unique feature of this particular ''Deposition'' is the empty space occupying the central pictorial plane as all the Biblical personages seem to fall back from this point. It has been suggested that this emptiness may be a physical representation of the
Virgin Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...
's emotional emptiness at the prospect of losing her son. On the wall to the right of the ''Deposition'', Pontormo frescoed an ''
Annunciation The Annunciation (; ; also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Annunciation of Our Lady, or the Annunciation of the Lord; ) is, according to the Gospel of Luke, the announcement made by the archangel Gabriel to Ma ...
'' scene (at left). As with the ''Deposition'', the artist's primary attention is on the figures themselves rather than their setting. Placed against white walls, the Angel
Gabriel In the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), Gabriel ( ) is an archangel with the power to announce God's will to mankind, as the messenger of God. He is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and the Quran. Many Chris ...
and
Virgin Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...
are presented in an environment that is so simplified as to almost seem stark. The fictive architectural details above each of them, are painted to resemble the gray stone ''pietra serena'' that adorns the interior of Santa Felicità, thus uniting their painted space with the viewer's actual space. The startling contrast between the figures and ground makes their brilliant garments almost seem to glow in the light of the window between them, against the stripped-down background, as if the couple miraculously appeared in an extension of the chapel wall. The ''Annunciation'' resembles his above-mentioned ''Visitation'' in the church of San Michele at Carmignano in both the style and swaying postures. Vasari tells us that the
cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...
was originally painted with
God the Father God the Father is a title given to God in Christianity. In mainstream trinitarian Christianity, God the Father is regarded as the first Person of the Trinity, followed by the second person, Jesus Christ the Son, and the third person, God th ...
and Four Patriarchs. The decoration in the
dome A dome () is an architectural element similar to the hollow upper half of a sphere. There is significant overlap with the term cupola, which may also refer to a dome or a structure on top of a dome. The precise definition of a dome has been a m ...
of the chapel is now lost, but four roundels with the Evangelists still adorn the
pendentive In architecture, a pendentive is a constructional device permitting the placing of a circular dome over a square room or of an elliptical dome over a rectangular room. The pendentives, which are triangular segments of a sphere, taper to point ...
s, worked on by both Pontormo and his chief pupil
Agnolo Bronzino Agnolo di Cosimo (; 17 November 150323 November 1572), usually known as Bronzino ( ) or Agnolo Bronzino, was an Italians, Italian Mannerism, Mannerist painter from Florence. His sobriquet, ''Bronzino'', may refer to his relatively dark skin or r ...
. The two artists collaborated so closely that specialists dispute which roundels each of them painted. This tumultuous oval of figures took three years for Pontormo to complete. According to Vasari, because Pontormo desired above all to "do things his own way without being bothered by anyone," the artist screened off the chapel so as to prevent interfering opinions. Vasari continues, "And so, having painted it in his own way without any of his friends being able to point anything out to him, it was finally uncovered and seen with astonishment by all of Florence..." A number of Pontormo's other works have also remained in Florence; the Uffizi Gallery holds his mystical '' Supper at Emmaus'' as well as portraits. Many of Pontormo's well-known canvases, such as the early ''Joseph in Egypt'' series () and the later ''Martyrdom of St Maurice and the Theban Legion'' () depict crowds milling about in extreme
contrapposto ( 'counterpoise'), in the visual arts, is a human figure standing with most of its weight on one foot, so that its shoulders and arms twist off-axis from the hips and legs in the axial plane. First appearing in Ancient Greece in the early 5th ...
of greatly varied positions. His portraits, acutely characterized, show similarly Mannerist proportions.


Lost or damaged works

Many of Pontormo's works have been damaged, including the lunettes for the cloister in the Carthusian monastery of Galluzo. They now are displayed indoors, although in their damaged state. Perhaps most tragic is the loss of the unfinished frescoes for the choir of the
Basilica of San Lorenzo, Florence The Basilica di San Lorenzo (Basilica of St. Lawrence) is one of the largest churches of Florence, Italy, situated at the centre of the main market district of the city, and it is the burial place of all the principal members of the Medici fam ...
which consumed the last decade of his life. His frescoes depicted a
Last Judgment The Last Judgment is a concept found across the Abrahamic religions and the '' Frashokereti'' of Zoroastrianism. Christianity considers the Second Coming of Jesus Christ to entail the final judgment by God of all people who have ever lived, res ...
day composed of an unsettling morass of writhing figures. The remaining drawings, showing a bizarre and mystical ribboning of bodies, had an almost hallucinatory effect. Florentine figure painting had mainly stressed linear and sculptural figures. For example, the Christ in Michelangelo's ''Last Judgment'' in the
Sistine Chapel The Sistine Chapel ( ; ; ) is a chapel in the Apostolic Palace, the pope's official residence in Vatican City. Originally known as the ''Cappella Magna'' ('Great Chapel'), it takes its name from Pope Sixtus IV, who had it built between 1473 and ...
is a massive painted block, stern in his wrath; by contrast, Pontormo's Jesus in the ''Last Judgment'' twists sinuously, as if rippling through the heavens in the dance of ultimate finality. Angels swirl about him in even more serpentine poses. If Pontormo's work from the 1520s seemed to float in a world little touched by gravitational force, the ''Last Judgment'' figures seem to have escaped it altogether and flail through rarefied air. In his ''Last Judgment,'' Pontormo went against pictorial and theological tradition by placing God the Father at the feet of Christ, instead of above him, an idea
Vasari Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance painter, architect, art historian, and biographer who is best known for his work '' Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'', considered the ide ...
found deeply disturbing:
But I have never been able to understand the significance of this scene, ... I mean, what he could have intended to signify in that part where there is Christ on high, raising the dead, and below His feet is God the Father, who is creating Adam and Eve. Besides this, in one of the corners, where are the four Evangelists, nude, with books in their hands, it does not seem to me that in a single place did he give a thought to any order of composition, or measurement, or time, or variety in the heads, or diversity in the flesh-colours, or, in a word, to any rule, proportion or law of perspective, for the whole work is full of nude figures with an order, design, invention, composition, colouring, and painting contrived after his own fashion ...


Critical assessment and legacy

Vasari's ''
Life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...
'' of Pontormo depicts him as withdrawn and steeped in neurosis while at the centre of the artists and patrons of his lifetime. This image of Pontormo has tended to colour the popular conception of the artist, as seen in the film of Giovanni Fago, ''Pontormo, a heretical love''. Fago portrays Pontormo as mired in a lonely and ultimately paranoid dedication to his final ''Last Judgment'' project, which he often kept shielded from onlookers. Yet as the art historian Elizabeth Pilliod has pointed out, Vasari was in fierce competition with the Pontormo/Bronzino workshop at the time when he was writing his ''
Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects ''The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'' () is a series of artist biographies written by 16th-century Italian painter and architect Giorgio Vasari, which is considered "perhaps the most famous, and even today the ...
''. This professional rivalry between the two ''bottega''s could well have provided Vasari with ample motivation for running down the artistic lineage of his opponent for
Medici The House of Medici ( , ; ) was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first consolidated power in the Republic of Florence under Cosimo de' Medici and his grandson Lorenzo "the Magnificent" during the first half of the 15th ...
patronage.See "An Introduction to Vasari's Story" in ''Pontormo, Bronzino, and Allori: A Genealogy of Florentine Art'' (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001). Perhaps as a result of Vasari's derision, or perhaps because of the vagaries of aesthetic taste, Pontormo's work was quite out of fashion for several centuries. The fact that so much of his work has been lost or severely damaged is a testament to this neglect, though he has received renewed attention from contemporary art historians. Indeed, between 1989 and 2002, Pontormo's '' Portrait of a Halberdier'' (at right), held the title of the world's most expensive painting by an
Old Master In art history, "Old Master" (or "old master")Old Masters De ...
. Regardless of the veracity of Vasari's account, it is certainly true that Pontormo's artistic idiosyncrasies produced a style that few were able (or willing) to imitate, with the exception of his closest pupil
Bronzino Agnolo di Cosimo (; 17 November 150323 November 1572), usually known as Bronzino ( ) or Agnolo Bronzino, was an Italians, Italian Mannerism, Mannerist painter from Florence. His sobriquet, ''Bronzino'', may refer to his relatively dark skin or r ...
. Bronzino's early work is so close to that of his teacher, that the authorship of several paintings from the 1520s and '30s is still under dispute—for example, the four ''tondi'' containing the Evangelists in the Capponi Chapel. Pontormo shares some of the mannerism of
Rosso Fiorentino Giovanni Battista di Jacopo (8 March 1495 – 14 November 1540), known as Rosso Fiorentino (meaning "Florentine Redhead" in Italian) or Il Rosso ("The Redhead"), was an Italian Mannerist painter who worked in oil and fresco Fresco ( or ...
and of
Parmigianino Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola (11 January 150324 August 1540), also known as Francesco Mazzola or, more commonly, as Parmigianino (, , ; "the little one from Parma"), was an Italian Mannerist painter and printmaker active in Florence, Rome, ...
. In some ways, he anticipated the
Baroque The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...
as well as the tensions of
El Greco Doménikos Theotokópoulos (, ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco (; "The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance, regarded as one of the greatest artists of all time. ...
. His eccentricities also resulted in an original sense of composition. At best, his compositions are cohesive. The figures in the ''Deposition'', for example, appear to sustain each other: removal of any one of them would cause the edifice to collapse. In other works, as in the Joseph canvases, the crowding makes for a confusing pictorial melee. It is in the later drawings that we see a graceful fusion of bodies in a composition which includes the oval frame of Jesus in the ''Last Judgement''.


Anthology of works


Early works (until 1521)


Mature works (1522–30)


Late works (after 1530)


See also

* Lost artworks


References


Further reading

*Krystof, Doris. ''Joseph Carrucci, known as Pontormo 1494–1557''. Köln: Konemann, 1988. *Keener, Chrystine. (2021). Pontormo's lost frescoes at San Lorenzo: political propaganda and dynastic symbolism /.


External links


Pontormo's paintings and drawings illustratedGiorgio Vasari's ''Vita''

A diary of his last two years survivesPontormo. Picturesand Biography"Jacopo Carucci da Pontormo, his life and works", by Frederik Mortimer Clapp, Oxford University Press, 1916
(at
Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...
)
Official website of the Church of San Michele Arcangelo, Carmignano, home of the Visitation
{{Authority control Italian Mannerist painters 16th-century Italian painters Italian male painters Italian Roman Catholics Painters from Tuscany 1494 births 1557 deaths People from Empoli Fresco painters Catholic painters