Giovanni Del Biondo

Italian painter. In 1356 he was granted Florentine citizenship as 'Iohannes Biondi de Casentino pictor'. Tax records show that he was resident in Florence from 1359 until his death, when his relatives assumed responsibility for his tax liabilities. The early sources, including Ghiberti and Vasari, do not mention him at all, despite the fact that he seems to have been extremely prolific, as a large number of his works survive. Only two of these are signed and dated: a small panel of the Virgin and Child (1377; Siena, Pinacoteca Nazionale), and the altarpiece (1392) for S Francesco Figline Valdarno. He was paid for this work in 1391, and the central panel with the Virgin and Child survives. A 17th-century source records another altarpiece (untraced) painted for S Sofia in Castelfiorentino, which bore the artist's name and the date 1360. His style is sufficiently distinctive, however, for a significant number of works to be ascribed to him with confidence. Since several of these are dated, his development can be followed fairly closely.

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