Baccio da Montelupo born Bartolomeo di Giovanni d'Astore dei Sinibaldi, was a sculptor of the Italian Renaissance

Italian Renaissance

The Italian Renaissance began the opening phase of the Renaissance, a period of great cultural change and achievement in Europe that spanned the period from the end of the 13th century to about 1600, marking the transition between Medieval and Early Modern Europe...

. He is the father of another Italian sculptor, Raffaello da Montelupo

Raffaello da Montelupo

Raffaello da Montelupo , born Raffaele Sinibaldi, was a sculptor and architect of the Italian Renaissance, and an apprentice of Michelangelo. He was the son of another Italian sculptor, Baccio da Montelupo...

. Both father and son are profiled in Vasari's Le Vite delle più eccellenti pittori, scultori, ed architettori (or, in English, Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects).

Life

Born into a family of modest social conditions in Montelupo Fiorentino

Montelupo Fiorentino

Montelupo Fiorentino is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 20 km southwest of Florence...

, he moved at eighteen to Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

 and pursued the study of sculpture, attending the "scuola" of Bertoldo di Giovanni

Bertoldo di Giovanni

Bertoldo di Giovanni was an Italian sculptor and medallist.Born in Florence, he was a pupil of Donatello and for a long time worked in his master's workshop, carrying out his unfinished works after his death in 1466, for example the bronze pulpit reliefs from the life of Christ in the Basilica di...

, founded in the gardens of Lorenzo de' Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici was an Italian statesman and de facto ruler of the Florentine Republic during the Italian Renaissance. Known as Lorenzo the Magnificent by contemporary Florentines, he was a diplomat, politician and patron of scholars, artists and poets...

 and attended by other young sculptors including Michelangelo

Michelangelo

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni , commonly known as Michelangelo, was an Italian Renaissance painter, sculptor, architect, poet, and engineer who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art...

, Giovanni Francesco Rustici

Giovanni Francesco Rustici

Giovanni Francesco Rustici was an Italian Renaissance painter and sculptor.He was born into a noble family of Florence, with an independent income...

, and Jacopo Sansovino

Jacopo Sansovino

Jacopo d'Antonio Sansovino was an Italian sculptor and architect, known best for his works around the Piazza San Marco in Venice. Andrea Palladio, in the Preface to his Quattro Libri was of the opinion that Sansovino's Biblioteca Marciana was the best building erected since Antiquity...

.

Baccio received his first important commission from the friars of the Basilica of San Domenico

Basilica of San Domenico

The Basilica of San Domenico is one of the major churches in Bologna, Italy. The remains of Saint Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers , are buried inside the exquisite shrine Arca di San Domenico, made by Nicola Pisano and his workshop, Arnolfo di Cambio and with later additions by Niccolò...

 in Bologna

Bologna

Bologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...

, for a "Compianto" (lamentation scene), a series of terracotta statues (c. 1495). He then returned to Florence where he created several wooden Crucifixes: at the Basilica di San Lorenzo

Basilica di San Lorenzo di Firenze

The Basilica di San Lorenzo is one of the largest churches of Florence, Italy, situated at the centre of the city’s main market district, and the burial place of all the principal members of the Medici family from Cosimo il Vecchio to Cosimo III...

 and San Marco, both in Florence, the Badia di SS. Flora e Lucilla in nearby Arezzo

Arezzo

Arezzo is a city and comune in Central Italy, capital of the province of the same name, located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about 80 km southeast of Florence, at an elevation of 296 m above sea level. In 2011 the population was about 100,000....

, and the church of San Martino in the Florentine municipality of Lastra a Signa

Lastra a Signa

Lastra a Signa is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 12 km west of Florence.-References:The hospital building was...

.

In Bologna, Baccio created 12 busts of the Apostles in terracotta (now in the Cathedral of Ferrara

Ferrara

Ferrara is a city and comune in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital city of the Province of Ferrara. It is situated 50 km north-northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream of the Po River, located 5 km north...

).

In 1506, Baccio received a commission for several sculptures for the Benedictine abbey of San Godenzo

San Godenzo

San Godenzo is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 35 km northeast of Florence, in the Tuscan-Emilian Apennines....

, of which today only the San Sebastiano survives.

The crowning moment of his career perhaps came with the commission in 1514 from a competition sponsored by the Florence silk merchants guild to create a statue in bronze for one of the remaining empty niches on the facade of Orsanmichele

Orsanmichele

Orsanmichele is a church in the Italian city of Florence...

. Vasari writes:

It is said that when he had made the figure in clay, all who saw the arrangement of the armatures, and the moulds laid upon them, held it to be a beautiful piece of work, recognizing the rare ingenuity of Baccio in such an enterprise; and when they had seen it cast with the utmost facility, they gave Baccio credit for having shown supreme mastery, and having made a solid and beautiful casting. These labors endured in that profession, brought him the name of a good and even excellent master; and that figure is esteemed more than ever at the present day by all craftsmen, who hold it to be most beautiful.

Baccio's bronze St. John the Evangelist took its place on the exterior of Orsanmichele

Orsanmichele

Orsanmichele is a church in the Italian city of Florence...

 beside works by Italian masters of the preceding century: Donatello

Donatello

Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi , also known as Donatello, was an early Renaissance Italian artist and sculptor from Florence...

, Lorenzo Ghiberti

Lorenzo Ghiberti

Lorenzo Ghiberti , born Lorenzo di Bartolo, was an Italian artist of the early Renaissance best known for works in sculpture and metalworking.-Early life:...

, and Nanni di Banco

Nanni di Banco

Nanni d'Antonio di Banco was an Italian sculptor from Florence.He helped create the winning model for the Duomo of the Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral in Florence , under the leadership of Filippo Brunelleschi, alongside Donatello...

.

In 1515 he created a marble edicola surrounding a fresco of the Virgin Mary in the church of Sant'Agostino at Colle di Val d'Elsa

Colle di Val d'Elsa

Colle di Val d'Elsa or Colle Val d'Elsa is a town and comune in Tuscany, Italy, in the province of Siena.It has a population of c. 20,000...

. Toward the end of the decade, he worked primarily in the area of Lucca

Lucca

Lucca is a city and comune in Tuscany, central Italy, situated on the river Serchio in a fertile plainnear the Tyrrhenian Sea. It is the capital city of the Province of Lucca...

, completing a marble Pietà for the church of Segromigno (1518). He then worked on a series of funeral monuments including Tomba del vescovo Silvestro Gigli (San Michele al Foro, with his son Raffaello; Monumento di San Silao (now at Museo di Villa Guinigi, Lucca); and Monumento a Giano Grillo (Santa Maria dei Servi, Bologna).

Baccio died around 1523, in Lucca.