MAZZIERE, Agnolo di Domenico - b. ~1466 Firenze, d. 1513 Firenze - WGA

MAZZIERE, Agnolo di Domenico

(b. ~1466 Firenze, d. 1513 Firenze)

Italian painter. Agnolo and Donnino del Mazziere ran a significant artistic enterprise in Florence during the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. The brothers were trained in the studio of the traditionalist painter Cosimo Rosselli, then they have established their own shop by the late 1480s. Vasari mentioned in the life of Cosimo Rosselli that Agnolo, the more talented of the brothers, was a skilled draftsman and remained a close friend of Cosimo Rosselli’s until the master’s death in 1507. That he was recognized as a painter of some technical proficiency is further attested by the fact that Michelangelo included him among the artists called to Rome in 1507-1508 to consult on preparations for the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

The Mazziere brothers produced altarpieces and fresco decorations for churches, confraternities in Florence and elsewhere in Tuscany. Although existing records do not distinguish between the brothers’ artistic contributions for any given commission, scholars assume that the bottega was a collaborative enterprise. Following Agnolo’s death in 1513, the shop continued its activity at least until Donnino is last mentioned in 1515.

The painter of a small number of stylistically similar works, including three altarpieces from the late 1480s and 1490s in the Augustinian church of Santo Spirito in Florence was named the Master of Santo Spirito in 1962. These core paintings, and the other works later attributed to him in steadily increasing numbers, reveal an artistic sensibility of a determined traditionalist nature, steeped in the stylistic approaches worked out in Florence during the 1470s and 1480s.

The Enthroned Madonna and Child between Two Angels and Saints Lucy and Peter Martyr in the Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice, was also attributed to the Master of Santo Spirito. This altarpiece was identified as the earliest recorded painting of the Mazziere studio, an altarpiece of 1490 for the hospital church of Santa Lucia in Florence. This panel is thus the evidence linking the recorded creations of the Mazziere brothers with the corpus of paintings ascribed to the Master of Santo Spirito. The authorship of a single artist or workshop for the substantial body of works given to the Master of Santo Spirito has received general scholarly acceptance.

Lucretia Announcing Her Suicide

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Portrait of a Boy

The unidentified sitter of this portrait is depicted half length, in a landscape, dressed in black robes and cap.

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Portrait of a Young Man

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Portrait of a Young Woman

This painting may have been produced in anticipation of a wedding, for on the back are a series of admonitions that can be thought of as allusions to ideal virtues of married life. The admonitions are mirrored in the girl’s expressionless features as well as in her pose. There can be no question that the picture is of an actual person.

The portrait is similar in concept (apart from the landscape background) to a slightly earlier work from the Ghirlandaio workshop, the Portrait of Selvaggia Sassetti.

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Portrait of a Youth

The brothers Agnolo di Domenico del Mazziere (1466-1513) and Donnino di Domenico del Mazziere (1460-after 1515) ran a significant workshop in Florence in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, but were known only through mentions in archives. It was not until 1988 that scholars were able to link them with actual paintings and drawings, which up to that time had been assigned to an unidentified artist called the Master of Santo Spirito. The workshop seems to have eagerly adopted innovations.

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Rest on the Flight into Egypt

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St Anthony Abbot

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Sts Bartholomew and Julian the Hospitaler

The present panel belongs to a lost altar-piece of which two other fragments are known showing The Virgin and Child and Sts Leonard and James the Great. The apostle Bartholomew is usually depicted with a knife, the instrument of his martyrdom. St Julian, a nobleman who accidentally murdered his parents, founded a hospice for travellers in atonement.

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Virgin and Child

This panel belonged to the same altarpiece as two other surviving fragments: Sts Leonard and James the Greater in the Mus�e de Petit Palais, Avignon, and Sts Bartholomew and Julian the Hospitaler in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Not only does the scale of the figures correspond in all three panels, but the architecture which serves as a backdrop appears to be continuous and has certain recurrent features.

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Virgin and Child with Sts John the Baptist and Verdiana

St Verdiana (died 1222 or 1242), who was a lay recluse, is the patron saint of the town of Castelfiorentino outside Florence. She made a pilgrimage to Rome and on returning home entered a cell where she was molested by serpents, but where she remained until her death. She is generally represented in painting as a middle-aged nun with two snakes and a basket.

Formerly this painting was attributed to an anonymous Florentine painter referred to as the Master of Santo Spirito who was active towards the end of the fifteenth century and who was named after the three important altarpieces he executed for the church of Santo Spirito. The body of paintings and drawings ascribed to this master was later convincingly linked to the Florentine workshop of the brothers Agnolo and Donnino del Mazziere.

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