ANDREA DEL SARTO
Florence 1486-1530
Andrea del Sarto was among the leading painters of the
High Renaissance in Florence. Although he was strongly
influenced by his older contemporaries, especially Leo-
nardo, Fra Bartolommeo, and Michelangelo, he rapidly
developed a distinctive style characterized by rich effects
of tone and color and subtly poetic expressive meaning.
Sarto was responsible for numerous major paintings and
frescoes in Florence, including the cycle of the life of the
Baptist in the Chiostro dello Scalzo and the Miracles of San
Filippo Benizzi and Birth of the Virgin in SS. Annunziata.
In 1518/19 he resided in France at the invitation of Francis
I, but he soon returned to Florence, where his wife had
remained. Sarto was highly influential on the next gen-
eration of Florentine painters, especially his pupils Pon-
tormo and Rosso Fiorentino.
BACICCIO (Giovanni Battista Gaulli)
Genoa 163 9-Rome 1709
Little is known about Baciccio's artistic training. He
moved from Genoa to Rome circa 1657. In Rome he be-
came the protégé of Gianlorenzo Bernini, who had a de-
cisive impact on his career. Initially, Baciccio painted
portraits. His first public commission was an altarpiece,
The Madonna and Child with Saints Roch and Anthony Ab-
bot, of circa 1663-66 (Rome, San Rocco a Ripetta). Circa
1666, at Bernini's recommendation, he was given the
commission to paint four pendentives for the church of
Sant'Agnese, Rome. In 1669 Baciccio visited Modena
and then Parma, where he saw Correggio's ceiling fres-
coes in the Duomo and San Giovanni Evangelista. Bacic-
cio worked in the Cappella Altieri in San Francesco a
Ripa, Rome, painting an altarpiece, The Virgin and Child
with Saint Anne, circa 1675 to accompany a sculpture by
Bernini. His most important commission, again given at
Bernini's suggestion, was for the nine frescoes he com-
pleted between 1672 and 1685 for the church of II Gesu,
Rome. The Triumph of the Name of Jesus of 1676-79 in
the vault set the standard for High Baroque illusionism.
DAVID BAILLY
Leiden 1584-1657
The son of Pieter Bailly, a writing and fencing master,
David first studied in Leiden with Adriaen van der
Burgh. Around this time he must have had contact with
the latter s brother-in-law, Jacques de Gheyn II, who
profoundly influenced his style. Later he received in-
struction in Amsterdam from Cornelis van der Voort,
probably in the art of still life painting as well as in por-
traiture. In 1608 Bailly began a lengthy tour of Europe,
including Italy, returning permanently to Leiden circa
1613. During the 1620 s in particular, he appears to have
been in demand for his miniaturistic portrait drawings,
which are stylistically continuous with earlier works in
this genre by Hendrick Goltzius and Jacques de Gheyn
II. His large-scale portrait paintings only became nu-
merous after 1630. Examples such as Christian Rosen-
krantz, signed and dated 1641 (Hillerd, Nationalhisto-
riske Museum paa Frederiksborg), show the sitter in a
domestic interior surrounded by objects that reveal his
interests and proclivities, a format Bailly derived from
the Amsterdam portraitist Thomas de Keyser. He was
also an early exponent of the vanitas still life, a genre that
flourished in Leiden, especially in the works of Bailly's
most prominent pupil, Jan Davidsz. de Heem.JACOPO BASSANO (Jacopo da Ponte)
Bassano del Grappa circa 1510-1592
Jacopo Bassano was the son of a minor painter from the
small town of Bassano, near Venice. While his date of
birth is uncertain, his activity as an artist began circa 1535.
Although he spent most of his life in Bassano, he was
closely allied with the Venetian tradition and became one
of the most important painters of the Véneto during the
sixteenth century, along with Titian, Tintoretto, and Ve-
ronese. Bassano employed Mannerist conventions in his
early paintings such as the Martyrdom of Saint Catherine
of circa 1535 (Bassano, Museo Civico). One of his ma-
ture masterpieces is the sumptuously colored Flight into
Egypt of 1542-43 (Pasadena, Norton Simon Museum),
which contains the pastoral element that became his
trademark. With his three sons Bassano formed a work-
shop whose output was prolific. Paintings such as The
Adoration of the Shepherds of circa 1550 (Bassano, Museo
Civico) were executed in multiple versions by him and
his workshop.BARTHEL BEHAM
Nuremberg i5O2-Italy 1540
Barthel may have been taught by his elder brother, Se-
bald Beham, as well as by Durer, whose style shaped his
early work. During the 15205 Barthel was especially ac-
tive as an engraver, producing small-scale technical mas-
terpieces such as Putto Riding on a Sphere through the Air.
Together with Sebald and Georg Pencz, he was expelled
from Nuremberg for atheism in 1525. He left the city per-
manently in 1527 and went to Munich, where he entered
the service of the dukes of Bavaria, Ludwig X and, later,
William IV. During this period he distinguished himself
as one of Germany's principal portrait painters with326 ARTISTS' BIOGRAPHIES