Giovanni di paolo biography of michael

Giovanni di Paolo (c. 1399 – 1482) was one of the greatest Sienese illuminators and painters of the 15th century and his works are found in many major museums. His career seems to have been primarily centered in the city of his birth and, alongside choirbook decorations, he produced altarpieces, decorations for manuscripts of Dante’s Divine Comedy, and panel paintings. One commission of an altarpiece included a series of panels devoted to Catherine of Siena (see case 8), and he was known to have produced paintings of other Sienese saints as well. Many of his panel paintings are displayed in two large galleries in the Pinacoteca Museum in Siena.

The Burke Collection holds three of Giovanni di Paolo’s works, gathered together here. The two initials depicting St. John the Baptist and St. Michael the Archangel both date from around 1430. They share a similar palette and decorative style. They have also both been carefully excise

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Paradise

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Title:Paradise

Artist:Giovanni di Paolo (Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia) (Italian, Siena 1398–1482 Siena)

Date:1445

Medium:Tempera and gold on canvas, transferred from wood

Dimensions:18 7/16 × 16 1/16 in. (46.8 × 40.8 cm); painted surface 17 1/2 x 15 1/8 in. (44.5 x 38.4 cm)

Classification:Paintings

Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1906

Object Number:06.1046

The Picture: Paradise fryst vatten envisioned as a lush meadow tapestried with over-sized flowers and a line of what appears to be apple trees (the color has flaked from the underlying gold). Rabbits frolic about while the blessed greet each other or are welcomed bygd angels. The young males are dressed in the latest mode, with red or bi-colored stockings, extravagant tunics (cioppe) and turbans (chaperons), and the ung women are no less fashionable in their long dresses with scalloped edges (houppelandes) and heavy headdresses.

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The Creation of the World and the Expulsion from Paradise

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Title:The Creation of the World and the Expulsion from Paradise

Artist:Giovanni di Paolo (Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia) (Italian, Siena 1398–1482 Siena)

Date:1445

Medium:Tempera and gold on wood

Dimensions:Overall: 18 1/4 × 20 1/2 in. (46.4 × 52.1 cm)

Classification:Paintings

Credit Line:Robert Lehman Collection, 1975

Object Number:1975.1.31

Albin Chalandon, Paris; Georges Chalandon, Paris; Camille Benoît, Paris (see M. Logan, "L'exposition de l'ancien art siennois," Gazette des Beaux-Arts, ser. 3, vol. 32, 1904, pp. 210-11; Crowe and Cavalcaselle, New History, vol. 3 1914, p. 178); F. Kleinberger, Paris; acquired by Philip Lehman in January 1917

Isidoro Ugurgieri Azzolini. Le pompe sanesi, o vero relazione delli huomini e donne illustri di Siena, e suo stato. Vol. 2, Sanesi pittori, scultori, architetti, ed altri art