Giovanni Balducci, called Il Cosci after his maternal uncle, (c. 1560 — c. 1600) 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...

 mannerist

Mannerism

Mannerism is a period of European art that emerged from the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520. It lasted until about 1580 in Italy, when a more Baroque style began to replace it, but Northern Mannerism continued into the early 17th century throughout much of Europe...

 painter. Born in 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....

, he was trained by Giovanni Battista Naldini

Giovanni Battista Naldini

Giovanni Battista Naldini was an Italian painter of a late-Mannerism in Florence.His first apprenticeship was in the studio of Jacopo Pontormo. He went from Rome for a number of months following 1560, and was recruited to work for Giorgio Vasari in 1562...

. He is one of the collaborators under the supervision of Vasari and Federico Zuccari

Federico Zuccari

Federico Zuccari, also known as Federigo Zuccaro , was an Italian Mannerist painter and architect, active both in Italy and abroad.-Biography:Zuccari was born at Sant'Angelo in Vado, near Urbino ....

 on the massive (1575-1579), yet generally uninspired decoration of the dome of the cathedral of Florence, Santa Maria del Fiore

Santa Maria del Fiore

The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore is the cathedral church of Florence, Italy. The Duomo, as it is ordinarily called, was begun in 1296 in the Gothic style to the design of Arnolfo di Cambio and completed structurally in 1436 with the dome engineered by Filippo Brunelleschi...

, ordered for the wedding of Ferdinand I de' Medici

Medici

The House of Medici or Famiglia de' Medici was a political dynasty, banking family and later royal house that first began to gather prominence under Cosimo de' Medici in the Republic of Florence during the late 14th century. The family originated in the Mugello region of the Tuscan countryside,...

, Grand Duke of Tuscany. He also assisted Alessandro Allori

Alessandro Allori

Alessandro di Cristofano di Lorenzo del Bronzino Allori was an Italian portrait painter of the late Mannerist Florentine school....

 in decoration of Vasari's Gallery for the Uffizi

Uffizi

The Uffizi Gallery , is a museum in Florence, Italy. It is one of the oldest and most famous art museums of the Western world.-History:...

. In 1590 he went to Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

, where he was taken under the protection of the Cardinal Alessandro de' Medici, by whom he was employed for some time. He was patronized, both in Florence and Rome, by the Medici Cardinal and later Pope Leo XI

Pope Leo XI

Pope Leo XI , born Alessandro Ottaviano de' Medici, was Pope from 1 April 1605 to 27 April of the same year.-Biography:...

. He executed a number of works in Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

, where he later died, including the frescoes in the cloister of S. Maria del Carmine.