Editing Baccio Bandinelli (section)

==Biography==
Bandinelli was the son of a prominent [[Florence|Florentine]] [[goldsmith]],<ref>Michelangelo de Viviano de Brandini of Gaiuole and his noble wife Catarina, a daughter of Taddeo Ugolino. Bandinelli produced a falsified genealogy connecting him with the noble Bandinelli of [[Siena]] in preparation for his induction into the chivalric Order of St James by [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V]], in Rome, 1530.</ref> and first apprenticed in his shop. As a boy, he was apprenticed under [[Giovanni Francesco Rustici]], a sculptor friend of [[Leonardo da Vinci]]. Among his earliest works was a ''Saint Jerome'' in [[Wax sculpture|wax]], made for [[Giuliano di Lorenzo de' Medici|Giuliano de' Medici]], identified as Bandinelli's by [[John Pope-Hennessy]].

[[Giorgio Vasari]], a former pupil in Bandinelli's workshop, claimed Bandinelli was driven by jealousy of [[Benvenuto Cellini]] and [[Michelangelo]]; and recounts that:
{{quote|text=(When) the cartoon of Michelangelo in the Council Hall ("Battle of Cascina" at Palazzo Vecchio)<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/m/michelan/4drawing/cascina/index.html | title=Web Gallery of Art, searchable fine arts image database }}</ref> was uncovered, and all the artists ran to copy it, and Baccio (most frequently) among (them),... having counterfeited the key of the chamber. In... 1512, Piero Soderini was deposed and the... Medici reinstated. In the tumult, therefore, Baccio, being by himself, secretly cut the cartoon into several pieces.

Some said he did it that he might have a piece of the cartoon always near him, and others that he wanted to prevent other youths from making use of it; others again say that he did it out of affection for Leonardo da Vinci, or from the hatred he bore to Michelangelo. The loss anyhow to the city was no small one, and Baccio's fault very great.}}

Bandinelli's lifelong obsession with Michelangelo is a recurring theme in assessments of his career.<ref>Kathleen Weil-Garris, "Bandinelli and Michelangelo: A Problem of Artist's Identity", in ''Art the Ape of Nature: Studies in Honor of H. W. Jansen,'' ed. by M. Barasch and L.F. Sandler. New York, 1981.</ref>

Bandinelli was a leader in the group of Florentine Mannerists who were inspired by the revived interest in [[Donatello]] attendant on the installation of Donatello's bas-relief panels for the pulpit in [[Basilica di San Lorenzo di Firenze|San Lorenzo]], 1515. The artist presented his relief of the ''Deposition'' to Charles V at Genoa in 1529; though the relief has been lost, a bronze from it by [[Antonio Susini (sculptor)|Antonio Susini]] in 1600 ([[Musée du Louvre]]) shows the decisive inspiration of Donatello's emotional pitch and intensity;<ref>Christopher Fulton, "Present at the Inception: Donatello and the Origins of Sixteenth-Century Mannerism" ''Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte'' '''60'''.2 (1997, pp. 166–199) p. 174 and fig. 9.</ref> Bandinelli made several drawings of the Donatello reliefs, though later in life he disparaged them in a letter to Cosimo I de' Medici.<ref>Fulton 1997: 178, note 15.</ref>

His sculptures have never inspired the admiration given those of Michelangelo, especially the colossal (5.05 m) marble group of ''[[Hercules and Cacus]]'' (completed in 1534) in the [[Piazza della Signoria]], Florence, and ''Adam and Eve'' in the Museo Nazionale del [[Bargello]], which both stand within sight of some of Michelangelo's masterworks. Vasari said of him "He did nothing but make ''[[bozzetto|bozzetti]]'' and finished little", and modern commentators have remarked on the vitality of Bandinelli's terracotta models contrasted with the finished marbles: "all the freshness of his first approach to a subject was lost in the laborious execution in marble... A brilliant draughtsman and excellent small-scale sculptor, he had a morbid fascination for colossi which he was ill-equipped to execute. His failure as a sculptor on a grand scale was accentuated by his desire to imitate Michelangelo."<ref>{{cite magazine|first=Otto |last=Kurz|title=A Model for Bandinelli's Statue of Cosimo I|magazine=The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs|volume=85|issue=500 |date=November 1944|page=280}} The terracotta ''bozzetto'' is at the [[Wallace Collection]], London.</ref>

''Hercules and Cacus'' was commissioned by the [[Medici]] pope [[Clement VII]], who had been shown a wax model. The supplied block of [[Carrara]] marble was not big enough to execute Bandinelli's original design. He had to make new wax models, one of which was chosen by the pope as the final draft. Bandinelli had already carved the sculpture as far as the abdomen of Hercules, when during the 1527 [[Sack of Rome (1527)|Sack of Rome]], the pope was taken prisoner. Meanwhile, in Florence, republican enemies of the Medici took advantage of the chaos to exile [[Ippolito de' Medici]]. Bandinelli, a supporter of the Medici, was also exiled. In 1530 Emperor [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V]] retook Florence after a long siege. Pope Clement VII subsequently installed his illegitimate son [[Alessandro de' Medici]] as duke of Tuscany. Bandinelli then returned to Florence and continued work on the statue, which was completed in 1534 and transported from the cathedral's workshop to its present marble [[pedestal]]. But from the moment it was unveiled, it faced ridicule; [[Benvenuto Cellini|Cellini]] compared the ponderous group to 'a sack full of melons'. Afterwards, Bandinelli tried to sabotage Cellini's career. The statue was restored between February and April 1994.

Bandinelli's drawings, which have in the past masqueraded as Michelangelo's in connoisseurs' collections, came into their own in the later twentieth century.

Among Bandinelli's pupils were Vasari and [[Francesco de' Rossi (Il Salviati)]]. His sons Clemente, a collaborator in his studio, and Michelangelo Bandinelli were also sculptors.

<gallery>
Battagliadicascina.jpg|The cartoon of the ''Battle of Cascina'' by [[Michelangelo]]
Galería Uffizi, Florencia, Italia, 2022-09-18, DD 75.jpg|Bandinelli’s copy of the ''[[Laocoön Group]]''
Pietà di baccio bandinelli 02.JPG|''Pietà,'' [[Basilica della Santissima Annunziata di Firenze|Basilica della Santissima Annunziata]], Florence
Baccio Bandinelli and coll., 5 of 24 reliefs from the choir of Santa Maria del Fiore, 1547-72, Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence.jpg|Baccio Bandinelli and collaborators, 5 of 24 reliefs from the [[Choir (architecture)|choir]] of [[Florence Cathedral|Santa Maria del Fiore]], 1547–72, [[Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Florence]]
</gallery>