Giorgio Vasari

Giorgio Vasari (Arezzo 1511 - Florence 1574) was a painter, architect and writer active in numerous Italian artistic centers, including Venice, Bologna, Naples, Rome and Florence.

In the Tuscan capital Vasari trained by studying Michelangelo and came into contact with the Medici family. Particularly attached to the figure of Cosimo I, Vasari produced several important works in Florence. In fact, he held the role of architect in the prestigious Uffizi building site starting in 1560 and was engaged in the realization of the pictorial decoration of the Salone dei Cinquecento in Palazzo Vecchio (1566-1571).

In Rome he came into contact with important Florentine patrons, such as Bindo Altoviti, for whom he created the frescoes now preserved in the Altoviti Room. He also linked his name to the requests of some members of families close to the pontiff, including the Farnese. On commission from Cardinal Alessandro Farnese in 1546 he created the celebratory frescoes of the Hall of the Hundred Days in the Palazzo della Cancelleria, while later for Pope Pius V he executed the paintings of the Sala Regia in the Vatican. For the same pope he also worked on the decoration of the church of Santa Croce in Bosco Marengo, the pontiff's hometown in the province of Alessandria.

In the extraordinary literary work Le vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architetti..., first published in 1550 and, with various modifications, in 1568, Vasari for the first time recounts the development of the history of Italian art, dividing the biographies of the artists into three periods starting from Cimabue up to his own time. In addition to singling out the figure of Michelangelo as the pinnacle of artistic progress, in the colossal work Vasari coins terms such as Gothic and Modern Mannerism and offers valuable information on the making of numerous works, now dispersed.