DOMENICO GHIRLANDAIO

 

Post 177 -by Gautam Shah

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SUNDAY Feature on ART of ARCHITECTURE

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Domenico Ghirlandaio (1449-1494) (Full name > Domenico di Tommaso Curradi di Doffo Bigordi) was a Florence-based Italian painter of the Renaissance period. Domenico had a large and thriving painting workshop, where his brothers, brother-in-law and later his son Ridolfo Ghirlandaio also worked with him. One of the young apprentice (age 13) from his workshop was Michelangelo (though remained only for a short while).

Ghirlandaio's narratives had two basic contrasts. He depicted contemporary life style and current day architecture with elemental classical elements. He also included portraits of rich and famous people within the context of religious narrations. Ghirlandaio painted extensive, well-filled, but uncrowded compositions, as he elaborated from detailed studies and sketches.

Ghirlandaio painted architecture without many details, often with bland surfaces. A sense of monumentality emerged in his compositions, because, he valued the location and illumination over the wall-art, and also included appropriate architectural landscape forms to include a sense of broadness. It is said, perhaps with the help of the Florentine architect Giuliano di San Gallo, he constructed immense Classical architectural settings to reinforce the narrative scenes.

The Sassetti Chapel and Sta Trinita, frescoes are among the best works. He preferred working in Tempera, though was familiar with the oil Painting. 

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