Fra Diamante was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 Renaissance painter.

Biography

Born at Prato

Prato

Prato is a city and comune in Tuscany, Italy, the capital of the Province of Prato. The city is situated at the foot of Monte Retaia , the last peak in the Calvana chain. The lowest altitude in the comune is 32 m, near the Cascine di Tavola, and the highest is the peak of Monte Cantagrillo...

, he was a Carmelite friar, a member of the Florentine

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....

 community of that order, and was the friend and assistant of Filippo Lippi

Filippo Lippi

Fra' Filippo Lippi , also called Lippo Lippi, was an Italian painter of the Italian Quattrocento .-Biography and works:...

. The Carmelite convent of Prato which he adorned with many works in fresco has been suppressed, and the buildings have been altered to a degree involving the destruction of the paintings. He was the principal assistant of Lippi in the large frescoes at the east end of the cathedral of Prato. He also collaborated in the Funeral of St. Jerome panel in the same church.

In the midst of the work he was recalled to Florence by his conventual superior, and a minute of proceedings of the commune of Prato is still extant, in which it is determined to petition the metropolitan of Florence to obtain his return to Prato, a proof that his share in the work was so important that his recall involved the suspension of it. Subsequently he assisted Filippo in the execution of the frescoes in the cathedral of Spoleto

Cathedral of Spoleto

Spoleto Cathedral is the cathedral of the Archdiocese of Spoleto-Norcia created in 1821, previously that of the diocese of Spoleto, and the principal church of the Umbrian city of Spoleto, in Italy...

, which Fra Diamante completed in 1470 after his master's death in 1469.

Lippi left a son ten years old (the future artist Filippino Lippi

Filippino Lippi

Filippino Lippi was an Italian painter working during the High Renaissance in Florence, Italy.-Biography:...

) to the care of Diamante, who, having received 200 ducat

Ducat

The ducat is a gold coin that was used as a trade coin throughout Europe before World War I. Its weight is 3.4909 grams of .986 gold, which is 0.1107 troy ounce, actual gold weight...

s from the commune of Spoleto, as the balance due for the work done in the cathedral, returned with the child to Florence, and, as art biographer Giorgio Vasari

Giorgio Vasari

Giorgio Vasari was an Italian painter, writer, historian, and architect, who is famous today for his biographies of Italian artists, considered the ideological foundation of art-historical writing.-Biography:...

says, bought land for himself with the money, giving but a small portion to the child. The accusation of wrong-doing, however, would depend upon the share of the work executed by Fra Diamante, and the terms of his agreement with Lippi. Fra Diamante must have been nearly seventy when he completed the frescoes at Spoleto, but the exact year of his death is not known.

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