Agnolo Di Cosimo (Agnolo Bronzino), “Saint Sebastian”, 1533, Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain
Agnolo Di Cosimo, known as Agnolo Bronzino, was a prominent artist of the second-wave of Italian Mannerism in the middle of the sixteenth century. Born to a poor Florentine family in 1503, he started his art education at the age of eleven as a pupil of Raffaelino del Garbo, a Renaissance painter from Florence. In 1515 Bronzino undertook an apprenticeship in Florence with the man who would become his biggest artistic influence and, some say, adopted father: Jacopo Carucci, better known as Pontormo.
In 1525, Pontormo called upon his pupil Agnolo Di Cosimo to help with what would be Pontormo’s masterpiece, the “Deposition from the Cross”. This altarpiece was painted in the Florentine church of Santa Felicità. Pontormo was commissioned to decorate the entire church with frescoes; in a testament to Pontormo’s trust in and affection for his pupil, Pontormo enlisted Di Cosimo to assist in the work.
After the Siege of Florence in 1530 which reinstalled the Medici family as rulers, Agnolo Di Cosimo fled to Urbino. There he was commissioned by the Duke of Urbino to paint a nude Cupid above an arch of the Imperiale vault. He was also commissioned by a prince of Urbino to paint his portrait. As Di Cosimo became known for his portraits, he became the official portraitist for the Medici family members. Di Cosimo is known mostly for these portraits, perhaps his greatest contribution to Italian Mannerism.
Agnolo Di Cosimo’s painting technicus is extremely controlled and meticulous, with immaculate attention to detail..His brushstrokes appear non-existent, which give his works, particularly his portraits, an extremely realistic, almost life-like appearance. Di Cosimo used the tehnique of chiaroscuro to bring attnetion to the light-colored figures in the painting, pushing them forward against the dark background. Chiaroscuro is an effect of contrasted light and shadow created by light falling unevenly or from a particular direction on the subject of the painting.