Fra Angelico

Biography

He was known to his contemporaries as Fra Giovanni da Fiesole ("Friar John of Fiesole"), reflecting the town where he joined the Dominican order, and Fra Giovanni Angelico ("Angelic Brother John"). In modern Italian, he is referred to as Beato Angelico ("Blessed Angelic One") following his beatification by Pope John Paul II.

Early life, 1395–1436

Fra Angelico was born around 1395 in Mugello, near Fiesole in Tuscany. He was baptised Guido di Pietro and had a younger brother named Benedetto. The earliest known record of him is dated 17 October 1417, when he joined a religious confraternity or guild at the Carmine Church under the name Guido di Pietro. Payments made to Guido di Pietro in January and February 1418 for work at the church of Santo Stefano del Ponte in Florence indicate that he was already working as a painter.

By 1423, Angelico had joined the convent of San Domenico in Fiesole. Following the custom of adopting a new name upon entering a religious order, he adopted the name Fra Giovanni (Friar John). As a Dominican, he relied on alms and donations rather than working for profit. Angelico initially trained as a manuscript illuminator and may have collaborated with his brother Benedetto, who also joined the Dominican Order. Several manuscripts with illuminations attributed to him are preserved at the former Dominican convent of San Marco, now a state museum. His artistic training may have included instruction from Lorenzo Monaco, and influences from the Sienese school are evident in his work. Angelico trained with Master Varricho in Milan. According to Giorgio Vasari, Angelico's first major work was an altarpiece and a painted screen for the Charterhouse (Carthusian monastery) of Florence, though nothing remains of these today.

From 1408 to 1418, Angelico painted frescoes, many of which have now been lost, at the Dominican friary of Cortona as an assistant to Gherardo Starnina or one of his followers. By 1418 he had returned to Fiesole, where he executed a number of works for the monastery, including the Fiesole Altarpiece. A predella of the altarpiece depicting Christ in Glory alongside over 250 figures, including beatified Dominicans, is conserved in the National Gallery. Around 1427, Angelico produced an altarpiece depicting the Coronation of the Virgin, which remained at San Domenico until 1812 when artist and collector Vivant Denon acquired it for the Louvre. Angelico also produced a Madonna of Humility now kept in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum. Also completed at this time were an Annunciation and a Madonna of the Pomegranate, both of which are now in the Prado Museum.

San Marco, Florence, 1436–1445

In 1436, Angelico was one of a number of friars from Fiesole who moved to the newly built convent of San Marco in Florence. This move placed him at the heart of artistic life of the region. During these years in Florence, he was certainly in contact with the three artistic circles in the city in the early 15th century: the school of miniaturists, the workshops of the last Giottesque students (followers of Giotto), and a group of young sculptors and architects destined for great fame: Jacopo della Quercia, Lorenzo Ghiberti, Filippo Brunelleschi and Donatello.

Angelico soon attracted the patronage of Cosimo de' Medici, one of the wealthiest and most powerful members of the city's governing authority (or "Signoria"), and founder of the Medici Dynasty that was set to dominate Florentine politics for much of the Renaissance. Cosimo had a cell reserved for himself at the friary so that he might "retreat from the world". Vasari reports that Cosimo commissioned Angelico to decorate the convent with frescoes, which were greatly admired at the time. They include the magnificent fresco of the Chapter House, the much-reproduced Annunciation at the top of the stairs leading to the cells, the Maesta (or Coronation of the Madonna) with Saints (cell 9), and many other smaller devotional frescoes in the cells depicting stories of the Nativity and Passion of Jesus.

In his early works, Angelico retained a Gothic style. In the small tabernacles of San Marco, however, the adroit simplicity of his compositions and colour begin to demonstrate his mature style that would remain characteristic of his works. In his Deposition of Christ, produced for the Strozzi Chapel in Santa Trinita, he reached the full expression of his style. In this painting, the naturalistic spirit of the 15th century is affirmed by the lifelike figures, who possess a variety of expressions and gestures, as well as in the representation of a naturalistic landscape, which replaced the traditional gold ground typical of the Gothic period.

The Vatican, 1445–1455

In 1445 Pope Eugene IV summoned Angelico to Rome to paint the frescoes of the Chapel of the Holy Sacrament at St Peter's, later demolished by Pope Paul III. Vasari suggests that at this time Angelico was offered the Archbishopric of Florence by Pope Nicholas V, which he rejected, recommending another friar in his place. However, the story runs against the historical facts. In 1445 the Pope was Eugene IV and Nicholas was not to be elected until two years later in March 1447. The archbishop in question during 1446–1459 was the Dominican Antoninus of Florence (Antonio Pierozzi), who was canonised by Pope Adrian VI in 1523.

In 1447 Angelico was in Orvieto with his pupil, Benozzo Gozzoli, executing works for the Cathedral. Among his other pupils was Zanobi Strozzi.{{cite web | access-date =2007-09-28 | archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20071014115346/http://nationalgalleryimages.co.uk/search.aspx?q=STROZZI,+Zanobi&mode=artist&frm=1 | archive-date =2007-10-14 | url-status =dead

From 1447 to 1449 Angelico was back at the Vatican, designing the frescoes for the Niccoline Chapel for Nicholas V. The scenes from the lives of the two martyred deacons of the Early Christian Church, St. Stephen and St. Lawrence may have been executed wholly or in part by assistants. The small chapel, with its brightly frescoed walls and gold leaf decorations, gives the impression of a jewel box. From 1449 until 1452, Angelico was back at his old convent of Fiesole, where he became the Prior.

Death and beatification

Fra Angelico died in 1455 while staying at a Dominican convent in Rome, perhaps on an order to work on Pope Nicholas' chapel. He was buried in the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, in Rome. Angelico was interred in a niche near the altar in a marble tomb, an honour for an artist of the period. The tombstone is an effigy carved in relief depicting Angelico in a Dominican habit. Above the tomb are two epitaphs, probably by Lorenzo Valla. The first reads:

Below this is inscribed:

The English writer and critic William Michael Rossetti wrote of the friar:

Pope John Paul II beatified Angelico on 3 October 1982 and in 1984 declared him patron of Catholic artists. John Paul II noted that:

He is commemorated by the current Roman Martyrology on 18 February, the date of his death in 1455. There the Latin text reads Beatus Ioannes Faesulanus, cognomento Angelicus ("Blessed John of Fiesole, known as the Angelic").

Evaluation

Background

Angelico worked during a period of significant change in European artistic style, marked by the transition from the Medieval tradition to the Early Renaissance. This shift began in the late fourteenth century with artists such as Giotto and his contemporaries, including Giusto de' Menabuoi. Both produced major works in Padua, while Giotto had earlier trained in Florence under the Gothic painter Cimabue.

Giotto's fresco cycle depicting the life of Saint Francis in the Bardi Chapel at Santa Croce in Florence represented a departure from earlier conventions through its emphasis on naturalism, spatial coherence, and emotional expression. His approach influenced a number of later painters who adopted and expanded upon his techniques. Among these artists were Pietro and Ambrogio Lorenzetti, whose work further developed narrative clarity and realism, contributing to the artistic foundations upon which Angelico and other Early Renaissance painters would build.[[File:Fra Angelico, Fra Filippo Lippi, The Adoration of the Magi.jpg|thumb|300px|The [[Adoration of the Magi (Fra Angelico and Filippo Lippi)|Adoration of the Magi]] is a [[Tondo (art)|tondo]] depicting the [[Adoration of the Magi|arrival of the Magi during the Nativity of Christ]]. It is credited to Fra Angelico and [[Filippo Lippi]] and dates to c. 1440/1460.]]

Altarpieces

The works of Angelico combine elements of the late Gothic tradition with emerging Renaissance principles. In the Coronation of the Virgin, an altarpiece painted for the Florentine church of Santa Maria Novella, Angelico employed features typical of prestigious fourteenth-century altarpieces, including a finely worked gold ground and extensive use of azurite and vermilion pigments. The gilded haloes and gold-edged garments reflect the refined decorative conventions of Gothic painting.

At the same time, the work demonstrates characteristics associated with the Renaissance. In contrast to earlier Gothic examples, such as altarpieces by Gentile da Fabriano, Angelico's figures are rendered with greater solidity, three-dimensional form, and naturalism. The drapery of the garments follows the structure of the bodies beneath, and the figures convey a sense of physical weight, despite being depicted standing on clouds rather than on solid ground.

Frescoes

The series of frescoes that Fra Angelico painted for the Dominican friars at San Marco realise the advancements made by Masaccio and carry them further. Away from the constraints of wealthy clients and the limitations of panel painting, Angelico was able to express his deep reverence for his God and his knowledge and love of humanity. The meditational frescoes in the cells of the convent have a quieting quality about them. They are humble works in simple colours. There is more mauvish pink than there is red, and the brilliant and expensive blue is almost totally lacking. In its place is dull green and the black and white of Dominican robes. There is nothing lavish, nothing to distract from the spiritual experiences of the humble people who are depicted within the frescoes. Each one has the effect of bringing an incident of the life of Christ into the presence of the viewer. They are like windows into a parallel world. These frescoes remain a powerful witness to the piety of the man who created them. Vasari relates that Angelico was inspired to create a large Crucifixion scene with many saints for the Chapter House after Cosimo de' Medici saw these works. As with the other frescoes, de' Medici's patronage did not influence Angelico's artistic expression with displays of wealth.

Masaccio ventured into perspective with his creation of a realistically painted niche at Santa Maria Novella. Subsequently, Angelico demonstrated an understanding of linear perspective, particularly in his Annunciation paintings set inside the sort of arcades that Michelozzo and Brunelleschi created at San Marco and the square in front of it.

Lives of the Saints

When Fra Angelico went to the Vatican to decorate the chapel of Pope Nicholas, he was again confronted with the need to please the very wealthiest of clients. In consequence, walking into the small chapel is like stepping into a jewel box. The walls are decked with the brilliance of colour and gold that one sees in the most lavish creations of the Gothic painter Simone Martini at the Lower Church of St Francis of Assisi, a hundred years earlier. Yet Angelico has succeeded in creating designs which continue to reveal his own preoccupation with humanity, humility, and piety. The figures, in their lavish gilded robes, have the sweetness and gentleness for which his works are famous. According to Vasari, "in their bearing and expression, the saints painted by Angelico come nearer to the truth than the figures done by any other artist."

It is probable that much of the actual painting was done by his assistants to his design. Benozzo Gozzoli was a highly accomplished painter but took his art further towards the fully developed Renaissance style with his expressive and lifelike portraits in his masterpiece depicting the Journey of the Magi, painted in the Medici's private chapel at their palazzo.

Artistic legacy

Through Fra Angelico's pupil Benozzo Gozzoli's careful portraiture and technical expertise in the art of fresco we see a link to Domenico Ghirlandaio, who in turn painted extensive schemes for the wealthy patrons of Florence, and through Ghirlandaio to his pupil Michelangelo and the High Renaissance.

When Michelangelo took up the Sistine Chapel commission, he was working within a space that had already been extensively decorated by other artists. Around the walls the Life of Christ and Life of Moses were depicted by a range of artists including his teacher Ghirlandaio, Raphael's teacher Perugino and Botticelli. They were works of large scale and exactly the sort of lavish treatment to be expected in a Vatican commission, vying with each other in the complexity of design, number of figures, elaboration of detail and skilful use of gold leaf. Above these works stood a row of painted Popes in brilliant brocades and gold tiaras. None of these splendours have any place in the work which Michelangelo created. Michelangelo, when asked by Pope Julius II to ornament the robes of the Apostles in the usual way, responded that they were very poor men.

Within the cells of San Marco, Fra Angelico had demonstrated that painterly skill and the artist's personal interpretation were sufficient to create memorable works of art, without the expensive trappings of blue and gold. In the use of the unadorned fresco technique, the clear, bright pastel colours, the careful arrangement of a few significant figures and the skillful use of expression, motion and gesture, Michelangelo showed himself to be the artistic descendant of Fra Angelico. Frederick Hartt describes Fra Angelico as "prophetic of the mysticism" of painters such as Rembrandt, El Greco and Zurbarán.

Vasari praised Fra Angelico: "it is impossible to bestow too much praise on this holy father, who was so humble and modest in all that he did and said and whose pictures were painted with such facility and piety."

Works

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Early works, 1408–1436

Unknown

• Saint James and Saint Lucy Predella, five panels, tempera, c. 1426 to 1428 Rome
• The Crucifixion, panel, c. 1420–1423, Metropolitan Museum, New York. Possibly Fra Angelico's only signed work. Oxford
• The Crucifixion with the Virgin, Saint John the Evanelist and the Magdalen. early 1420s. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Purchased from a private collection in November 2024. Cortona
• Annunciation, c. 1430, Diocesan Museum, Cortona Fiesole
• Coronation of the Virgin, altarpiece with predellas of Miracles of St Dominic, Church of San Domenico, Louvre, Paris
• Virgin and Child between Saints Thomas Aquinas, Barnabas, Dominic and Peter Martyr, altarpiece, San Domenico, 1424
• Christ in Majesty, predella, National Gallery, London. Florence, Basilica di San Marco
• Dormition of the Virgin, 1431 Florence, Santa Trinita
• Deposition of Christ, altarpiece, National Museum of San Marco, Florence.
• Coronation of the Virgin, c. 1432, Uffizi, Florence
• Coronation of the Virgin, c. 1434–1435, Louvre, Paris Florence, Santa Maria degli Angeli
• Last Judgement, Accademia, Florence Florence, Santa Maria Novella
• Coronation of the Virgin, altarpiece, Uffizi.

San Marco, Florence, 1436–1445

• Altarpiece for chancel – Virgin with Saints Cosmas and Damian, attended by Saints Dominic, Peter, Francis, Mark, John Evangelist and Stephen. Cosmas and Damian were patrons of the Medici. The altarpiece was commissioned in 1438 by Cosimo de' Medici. It was removed and disassembled during the renovation of the convent church in the seventeenth century. Two of the nine predella panels remain at the convent; seven are in Washington, Munich, Dublin and Paris. Unexpectedly, in 2006 the last two missing panels, Dominican saints from the side panels, turned up in the estate of a modest collector in Oxfordshire, who had bought them in California in the 1960s.{{cite web | access-date =2014-05-29 }}

• Altarpiece? – Madonna and Child with Twelve Angels (life sized); Uffizi.
• Altarpiece – The Annunciation
• San Marco Altarpiece
• Two versions of the Crucifixion with St Dominic; in the Cloister
• Very large Crucifixion with Virgin and 20 Saints; in the Chapter House
• The Annunciation; at the top of the Dormitory stairs. This is probably the most reproduced of all Fra Angelico's paintings.
• Virgin Enthroned with Four Saints; in the Dormitory passage

Each cell is decorated with a fresco which matches in size and shape the single round-headed window beside it. The frescoes are apparently for contemplative purposes. They have a pale, serene, unearthly beauty. Many of Fra Angelico's finest and most reproduced works are among them. There are, particularly in the inner row of cells, some of the less inspiring quality and of the more repetitive subject, perhaps completed by assistants. Many pictures include Dominican saints as witnesses of the scene each in one of the nine traditional prayer postures depicted in De Modo Orandi. The friar using the cell could place himself in the scene.

• The Adoration of the Magi
• The Transfiguration
• Noli me tangere
• The Three Marys at the Tomb.
• The Road to Emmaus, with two Dominicans as the disciples
• The Mocking of Christ
• There are many versions of the Crucifixion

Late works, 1445–1455

Orvieto Cathedral

Three segments of the ceiling in the Cappella Nuova, with the assistance of Benozzo Gozzoli.

• Christ in Glory
• The Virgin Mary
• The Apostles

Niccoline Chapel

The Chapel of Pope Nicholas V, at the Vatican, was probably painted with much assistance from Benozzo Gozzoli and Gentile da Fabriano. The entire surface of the wall and ceiling is sumptuously painted. There is much gold leaf for borders and decoration, and a great use of brilliant blue made from lapis lazuli.

• The Life of St Stephen
• The Life of St Lawrence
• The Four Evangelists.

Discovery of lost works

In September 2006 two works by Angelico were identified in a private collection in Oxford. The owner, Jean Preston, had inherited them from her father, who had bought them for £100 in the 1960s. Preston had recognised them as high-quality Florentine Renaissance, but did not realize that they were works by Angelico until they were identified in 2005 by Michael Liversidge of Bristol University.{{cite news | access-date =2007-09-28 }} The works are two of eight side panels of the San Marco Altarpiece, produced in 1439 and later separated by Napoleon's army. While the centre section is still held in San Marco, the other six side panels are in German and US museums. The Italian Government had hoped to purchase them but they were outbid at auction on 20 April 2007 by a private collector for £1.7M.{{cite news | access-date =2007-09-28 }} Both panels are now restored and exhibited in the San Marco Museum in Florence.

Footnotes

References

• Rossetti's article includes an assessment of the body of work, from the pre-Raphaelite viewpoint.
• Hood, William. Fra Angelico at San Marco. Yale University Press, 1993.
• Morachiello, Paolo. Fra Angelico: The San Marco Frescoes. Thames and Hudson, 1990.
• Frederick Hartt. A History of Italian Renaissance Art, Thames & Hudson, 1970.
• Giorgio Vasari. Lives of the Artists. first published 1568. Penguin Classics, 1965.
• Donald Attwater. The Penguin Dictionary of Saints. Penguin Reference Books, 1965.
• Luciano Berti. Florence, the city and its Art. Bercocci, 1979.
• Werner Cohn. Il Beato Angelico e Battista di Biagio Sanguigni. Revista d'Arte, V, (1955): 207–221.
• Stefano Orlandi. Beato Angelico; Monographia Storica della Vita e delle Opere con Un'Appendice di Nuovi Documenti Inediti. Florence: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1964.

References

1. Finocchio, Ross. (2006-10-01). "Fra Angelico (ca. 1395–1455) - The Metropolitan Museum of Art".
2. "Metropolitan Museum of Art".
3. Werner Cohn, ''Il Beato Angelico e Battista di Biagio Sanguigni.'' Revista d'Arte, V, (1955): 207–221.
4. Stefano Orlandi, ''Beato Angelico; Monographia Storica della Vita e delle Opere con Un'Appendice di Nuovi Documenti Inediti.'' Florence: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1964.
5. [[Giorgio Vasari]], ''Lives of the Artists''. Penguin Classics, 1965.
6. Williamson, Beth. (2018). "Fra Angelico: Heaven On Earth". Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Paul Holberton Publishing.
7. "Gherardo Starnina". [[Getty Center]].
8. Gordon, Dillian. (2002). "Fra Angelico's Predella for the High Altarpiece of San Domenico, Fiesole". National Gallery Company.
9. Rubin, Patricia. (2004). "Hierarchies of Vision: Fra Angelico's "Coronation of the Virgin" from San Domenico, Fiesole". Oxford Art Journal.
10. Papini, Roberto. "ANGELICO, il Beato (Enciclopedia Italiana – 1929)".
11. Norwich, John Julius. (1990). "Oxford Illustrated Encyclopedia Of The Arts". Oxford University Press.
12. Frederick Hartt, ''A History of Italian Renaissance Art'', (1970) Thames & Hudson, {{ISBN. 0-500-23136-2
13. The tomb has been given greater visibility since the beatification.
14. Rossetti, William Michael (as attributed). (18 March 2016). "Fra Angelico". orderofpreachersindependent.org.
15. (1999). "John Paul II's Book of Saints". Our Sunday Visitor.
16. ''[[Martyrologium Romanum]], ex decreto sacrosancti oecumenici Concilii Vaticani II instauratum auctoritate Ioannis Pauli Pp. II promulgatum, editio [typica] altera, Typis Vaticanis, A.D. MMIV'' (2004), p. 155 {{ISBN. 88-209-7210-7
17. Zuffi, Stefano. (2003). "The Renaissance: 1401-1610: the splendor of European art". Barnes & Noble Books.
18. Paolo Morachiello, ''Fra Angelico: The San Marco Frescoes''. Thames and Hudson, 1990. {{ISBN. 0-500-23729-8
19. [http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/43.98.5/ ''The Crucifixion''] in the online databank of the MET.
20. Ross Finocchio in an [https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/fang/hd_fang.htm essay on Fra Angelico] at ''The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History'' in 2006.
21. Cooper, Donal, [https://apollo-magazine.com/apollo-awards-2025-acquisition-winner/ "Acquisition of the Year"] ''Apollo'', December 2025, pp. 60-61.
22. "''Dormition of the Virgin''".