Catholic Reform and Bernardino Poccetti's Chiostro dei Morti at the church of SS Annunziata in Florence

Apollo, Sept, 2003 by Gauvin Alexander Bailey

The main inspiration for Poccetti's panoramic views and genre detail comes from the fresco cycles of quattrocento Tuscany, and the naturalism of his figures and landscapes was enhanced by an appreciation of northern painting. (12) However, Poccetti was not immune to more recent trends, notably the Catholic Reform's appeal to the emotions. The colours of Poccetti's draperies were highlighted with abrupt changes of light and flickering surfaces in the manner of Federico Barocci (1535-1612), an affective use of colour which was favoured by many reformist religious orders, most notably the Capuchins and the Oratorians (Fig. 7). (13) Yet, like Santi before him, Poccetti refused to abandon the courtly grace of the Florentine tradition, and his figures never descend to the earthier piety of much Roman painting of the time. Most notably, Poccetti stayed away from tenebrism--a manner which did not translate well into fresco anyway--preferring a more even balance between line and light. (14) This combination of piety and grace made Poccetti one of the most active and sought-after painters of his day.

Poccetti did not begin his career as a reformer. He was first known for his decorative grotteschi, earning him the nickname Bernardino delle Grottesche. (15) After studying with the Florentine painter Michele Tosini, also known as Michele di Ridolfo (1503-77), and later Bernardo Buontalenti (1531-1608), Poccetti made a living as a facade painter, and he also executed frescoes in Buontalenti's Grotto at the Palazzo Pitti. (16) In 1570, Poccetti entered the Accademia del Disegno, whose capitolo off the cloister of SS Annunziata was about to be decorated by a team including Vasari, Santi, and Allori. (17) He rented his own shop on Via Palagio from the Badia Fiorentina in 1574, and probably travelled to Rome in 1579 to study Raphael's Loggia di Psiche in the Farnesina. After his return, Poccetti devoted most of his energies to history cycles, beginning with the Chiostro Grande at S Maria Novella in 1581, one of the largest commissions of the last quarter century in Florence. (18)

Florentine patrons quickly responded to Poccetti's ability to bring clarity and pageantry to historical painting, and the young artist was in great demand. In 1585-90, he joined Naldini, Alessandro Fei (1543-92), Cosimo Gheri (active late sixteenth/early seventeenth century), and others, in a fresco commission at the cloister and church of the Confraternity of the SS Annunziata, including a Marian cycle for the church, a Passion cycle for the vestibule, and a large-scale martyrdom cycle in the cloister, the first example of this kind of Jesuit-inspired iconography in Florence. (19) Poccetti spent most of the 1590s working for various Carthusian houses, including the Certosa of Galluzzo, the Certosa of Pontignano (Siena), and the Certosa of Calci (Pisa). (20) Although he reverted to a more virtuoso and complex maniera style of the sort customarily employed for palace decoration in the Giglio Chapel at S Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi (1599), he spent the first decade of the 1600s working in his more public didactic style, in such places as the Chiostro di Ponente at S Maria degli Angeli (1600-1601) and the church of SS Annunziata in Pistoia, as well as in the three lunettes he contributed to the cycle representing the life of St Antoninus in the Chiostro di Sant'Antonino at S Marco in Florence (c. 1602-1604). (21)